


One Problem At A Time

by sarahsilverdog



Category: Zoo (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2017-11-26
Packaged: 2019-02-07 05:54:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 26,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12834714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarahsilverdog/pseuds/sarahsilverdog
Summary: The post-finale adventures of the Zoo crew.





	1. Chapter 1

EVEN WALLS FALL DOWN

You got a heart so big  
It could crush this town  
And I can't hold out forever  
Even walls fall down. ~Tom Petty, "Walls"

 

If there was one thing Jackson Oz should have learned after ten years of working and dealing with her it was this: You didn't want to get on Jamie Campbell's fucking list.

She wasn't upset that he didn't trust her, hell, she'd earned that from him at the least. She wasn't really mad about being locked in the plane's cell either, though it still rankled her that she let him catch her off guard enough to succeed at it. And if she were honest with herself, the majority of her anger wasn't coming from his insane decision to knock a giant hole in the Barrier either, though she certainly wasn't happy about the prospect of battling every animal in North America again. No, her fury stemmed from another source altogether.

Jackson fucked with her plane.

HER PLANE.

In the years after losing Mitch on Pangaea, and in the awful time after Max took Clementine away from her, her only connection to Mitch was the plane. On the long nights when she was too exhausted from chasing down Shepherds to close her eyes she would wander his lab, running her hands along the cool, clean lines of the equipment, remembering him in his world, hunched over a microscope, or listening to Soundgarden while he pored over a pile of mystery bones. The nights after Logan left her and she couldn't bear the empty, echoing penthouse for another second, she sat at the bar, drinking as she imagined Mitch beside her, working a crossword puzzle and a bottle of vodka at the same time. The nights when she was so lonely she couldn't bear to exist, the plane was there to remind her, to soothe her...to save her. She'd told Mitch when he'd first come out of the tank that she kept the plane because she thought it should stay in the family, and that was true- the team had been the closest thing she'd had to a family since her mother died and the plane had been the closest thing she'd had to a home in a long, long time. But the truth was she'd kept it to be near him in the only way she could.

The shock of it crashing through the Barrier knocked Jackson and Tessa off their feet; before they could recover Jamie jerked free of Mitch's protective hold on her and strode furiously through the pelting rain of dust and debris from the crumbling wall. The plane's engines were still running but its forward momentum had stopped and she could feel the whine of the turbines agitating her already furiously buzzing brain; when she reached Jackson, just as he rose to his knees she kicked him full in the face, knocking him over on his back where he lay groaning in the dirt. Tessa reached for her rifle that lay just out her grasp but Jamie pointed the pistol she still held at her and snapped, "Don't try me."

The plane's navigational tablet lay in the dust a few feet away and Jamie stepped over Jackson's legs to pick it up. He struggled to a sitting position, holding his hand over an already swelling, bloody eye. "What the hell, Jamie?"

She knew it was irrational, she knew it was grief speaking - grief for Logan, grief for the world once Abigail's monsters roamed free - but she swung on Jackson, pointing the pistol at his face as Abe and Dariela sprang forward with a shout. She felt Mitch at her elbow too, but she kept her gaze on Jackson and Tessa, who had crawled to his side and was halfway shielding Jackson from Jamie's gun. Her eyes were hard and her voice was cold when she spoke. "I spent years hunting down the people who tried to destroy the world. Your father's friends, and your sister's friends, who sterilized mankind and who are so close to ending the human race. I did unspeakable things to stop them, terrible things you can't even imagine."

She heard Mitch mutter to Clem behind her, "Tandoori restaurant, sewer. Ask her about it sometime." 

"It seems that every time something horrible happens in the world, there's an Oz behind it." She could feel the fury welling inside her, and her hand shook slightly as she waved her gun at the gaping hole in the barrier, still hazed with dust. "You just doomed us all on the promise of a madwoman. Maybe we've been worrying about the wrong member of the Oz family, going after your sister. Maybe you're the Oz we need to stop."

Abe tried to placate her, reaching a hand out between her and Jackson. "Jamie, please, think for a moment. We are all under a lot of pressure, Jackson only did what he thought was right."

She glanced at Abe and nodded coldly. "I did what I thought was right and he locked me in a cage for it."

Sirens started whooping across the compound as a metallic voice erupted suddenly from the loudspeaker. "ALERT! ALERT! THE BARRIER HAS BEEN BREACHED. REPORT TO EVACUATION ZONES." 

Mitch touched Jamie's arm lightly but she felt the urgency behind it- and the worry. "Can we revisit this later? I think we need to get inside now."

Abe nodded in agreement. "Mitch is right. The beacon was disabled so the hybrids are not attacking yet but they will before long. It's not safe out here."

He reached down to help Jackson up, looking up at Jamie questioningly. She sighed and lowered the gun but said darkly, "We're not done here."

"No," Jackson glowered back at her, touching his tender head, "I'd say we're not. But right now I have a phone call to make. Let Abigail know she got what she wanted." 

"Lets get to the infirmary," Dariela added. "They reinforced it during the hybrid attack, and we can check on Sam while we're there." 

Everyone started to move towards the interior of the compound but Jamie held back, sticking her pistol in her waistband and turning her attention to the navigational tablet. The plane was still running, the engines whining at an uncomfortably high pitch, though it was largely unnoticed among the chaos of evacuations and the blaring warning sirens. Mitch realized she wasn't with them and stopped Clem, muttering something in her ear. She glanced at Jamie, nodded at her father, and turning back to the others trotted to catch up as they went through the armored doors into the interior. He watched his daughter walk into the safe area inside the building, nodded to himself, then turned back to Jamie. 

She was working the tablet furiously, her fingers skittering over it so fast they were a blur. She glanced up at Mitch, frowning with concentration and said, "I have to get these engines turned off. They draw air in, superheat it and expel it for thrust and right now they are sucking in dust and little bits of concrete from the crash and eventually they are going to clog up, which means no air flow, which means overheating which means-"

"Boom," Mitch finished for her, pushing his glasses up on his nose as he peered over her shoulder at the display. "Everybody in the compound burns alive. Including us. So why isn't it working?"

"I don't know," she replied, her voice tight. The engines had grown noticeably louder, making the air vibrate around them. "Maybe something was broken when Jackson dropped it. I've tried just about everything, but maybe this..." she hesitated, tapped the tablet once, then half-smiled at him and asked, "There's still some of the good stuff on the plane, wanna go get a drink?" 

Before he could answer the rear of the plane started to shudder and the vehicle bay hatch started to slowly drop, screeching as it scraped against the concrete remains of the wall. It was at least fifty yards from where they stood, and well outside of what had been the perimeter. She'd have to make it to the pile of rubble, then climb over it to get into the bay, and then make it to the handle on the wall to close the ramp. Mitch shook his head, "No, Jamie, it's too far. There could still be hybrids out there-"

She pulled the pistol from her waistband and slapped it into Mitch's hand, kissing him quickly as she said, "And that's why I need you to cover me. I have to turn them off, Mitch, this is the only way." Before he could reply, or even kiss her back, she was gone, sprinting toward the open bay door as the plane's engines started to shriek in earnest. She made it to the debris pile without incident, but as she started to navigate her way over the uneven rubble a shadowy, wolf-like figure loomed out of the dust above her. Mitch shouted to her as he raised her pistol and fired a shot, catching the razorback in the eye, killing it instantly; Jamie looked up just in time to see the hybrid tumble past her, landing dead on the ground. "Nice shootin', Tex!" she called to him, "But where there's one, there's more, so if you're coming you'd better run!"

She didn't wait to see if he was following, the bay was only a few feet away and the plane was beginning to shriek and shake with the strain of the engines. Three steps and she was in, her feet made contact with the steel floor and she was running up the ramp to the handle that would draw it back up.

"Close the hatch, Jamie!" she suddenly heard Mitch shout in panic and then several gunshots; jerking the handle until the ramp started to rise, she ran to the edge just as Mitch launched himself through, tossing the pistol to Jamie. "SHOOT IT!" he screamed and Jamie expertly maneuvered the pistol up just as a massive, monstrous, scaly green-brown head, long and narrow and lined with sharp, gnashing teeth appeared, then a three-toed claw with six inch long talons hooked itself over the edge of the rising ramp, straining to pull itself up and over after them. Jamie fired twice and the beast shrieked and lost its grip, falling away as the bay sealed itself. 

"What the hell was that?" Jamie gasped.

Wide eyed and panting, Mitch said, "Some kind of...dinosaur?"

She frowned at him, shook her head and rose shakily to her feet. "I'm not even going to try to process that," she said, looking uneasily at the hatch. "Engines first, then dinosaur hybrids."

Mitch scrambled to his feet behind her. "I'm good with that," he said, and they sprinted up the staircase to the cockpit. While she had turned it into a breakfast nook, because honestly, you couldn't beat the view, Jamie also had the sense to leave the controls intact because, as Jackson had so amply proven today, it was also easy to commandeer or break the tablet. She ran to the control panel and in one practiced movement flipped four switches to the off position, sighing with relief as the whine of the engines immediately slowed and started winding down. 

Mitch sagged into one of the breakfast nook chairs, rubbing his eyes wearily under his glasses; Jamie leaned lightly against the control panel, watching him as the plane grew quieter. Since he had come back from the dead it was like she couldn't get enough of him, even if it was just watching him tiredly rub his eyes, or pour a drink, or to touch his shoulder in passing. She tried to hide it, the hunger for him, especially around the others, but she was pretty sure she was failing miserably. Even Max had seen it when he rejoined them in Peru. 

Max, She smiled softly thinking about Mitch's father, who had died holding his newborn great-grandson after saving them all from toxic spores in South Korea. He had caused her so much pain when he took Clementine away that she was sure she could never forgive him but like every other woman in his life, apparently, she did. He had been a charming devil.

Mitch opened his eyes and caught her small smile, which he returned. "What are you thinking about?" he asked. "Hybrid dinosaurs? Shepherd hunting? Missing cats in Brentwood?"

She laughed at that and shook her head. "Max."

She expected Mitch to frown, which was his usual reaction to any mention of Max, but instead he smiled too, though it was tinged with sadness. "I never thought I'd say it, but I miss the old bastard. I don't forgive him, but I miss him."

Jamie smiled at that and sat across from Mitch in the other nook chair. They were so close their knees touched but neither made a move toward the other. "He loved you. I was supposed to tell you that about eleven years ago but..." she swallowed suddenly, remembering why she hadn't passed that message on, "but it slipped my mind."

"Oh really," Mitch snorted, "I can just imagine that conversation. How many times did he hit on you before he mentioned that?" Bitterness had seeped into his tone and Jamie reached out and took Mitch's hand. 

"I stopped him in the hall after you and he hashed it out about Allison," she said, looking down at the hand she held, caressing his fingers but avoiding his gaze. "I told him I was glad I had met him because it helped me to understand you." Mitch squeezed her hand and she looked up at him, her face flushing bright red, "He said, 'I think you love my son' and I told him he was crazy. He said, 'Well, I love my son,' and asked me to tell you."

Mitch was quiet for a few seconds, then asked, "Was he?"

"Was he what?" Jamie asked in confusion.

Mitch cupped the side of her face with his free hand and drew her eyes up to his. "Was he crazy?"

Before Jamie could form a reply Mitch's phone rang, startling them both out of the moment. Mitch let his fingers caress her cheek as he withdrew them and she held on to his hand for an extra beat before he cleared his throat, put the phone up to his ear and answered, "Yeah?"

Clem's voice sounded small and scared. "Dad, where are you?"

***


	2. There's Something Happening Here

THERE'S SOMETHING HAPPENING HERE

There's a man with a gun over there,  
Telling me I got to beware,  
Stop, hey what's that sound?  
Everybody look what's going down.  
~Buffalo Springfield

 

"Dad? Where are you? Are you okay?" 

The real world came crashing back down around them, hybrids and babies and insanity. Jamie rose from the cool white breakfast nook chair and wandered to the cockpit window to see what was happening in the compound as Mitch cleared his throat again and answered. "We're fine, Clem. We're on the plane. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, Dad. We're all fine. But everyone evacuated, we're the only ones left." Her voice took on a new urgency. "Abe is here with me and we have some news. Sam woke up and we explained what happened. He says he may know where Abigail is, some lab she has here in the southwest. He says its the only place he knows of that is close."

Jamie spoke up before Mitch could answer. "I thought Jackson made a deal with Abigail," she said, "to let the hybrids through in exchange for Baby Sam."

Clem's voice was tight with tears. "Abigail isn't responding to us. Jackson has tried her but she's not answering, she's not...I know she's not going to give him back. We have to find him, Dad!" Fury flared up inside Jamie again but she quashed it down. Now was not the time for darkness.

Mitch was on his feet, pacing as much as he could in the small cockpit area. "So, where is this lab?"

Abe's deep voice answered him. "In the mountains outside of Phoenix. Unfortunately, without the plane, we will never make it in time to administer the sterility cure."

Mitch threw his free hand in the air. "Well, unfortunately Roger Ramjet rammed our jet through a giant wall, so that's out-"

Jamie, still watching out the cockpit window at the deserted compound, interjected. "We still have the plane."

Mitch took the phone from his ear and squinted at her through his glasses. "What are you talking about? This thing was just used as a battering ram through a concrete wall. It's going to have some damage to the body or the wings."

"Actually, it's not," Jamie retorted, pushing herself away from the control panel and getting closer to Mitch. "A few years ago I had an incident with a wall some idiot built on the Mexico/US border that nearly killed me and the Shepherd I had just captured in Mexico City. I decided to have the plane sheathed in super strong carbon fiber coating. Lighter than aluminum, stronger than steel." She nodded out the window at the remains of the barrier. "Or concrete. I'll have to run some quick diagnostics to be sure, but if we can get the engines cleaned out and find a stretch of land long enough to use as a runway, we can get back in the air."

Mitch was staring at her with something between amusement, annoyance, and admiration. "Carbon fiber sheathing. Of course you did." He caught her eyes and held her gaze as he said into the phone, "Okay, Abe, according to Super Jamie, the plane is still an option. So let's come up with a plan."

***

Jamie had disappeared into the belly of the plane to start working on cleaning debris from the engines. Mitch left her to it; knowing her, she had some fancy gadget installed to take care of just such a situation.

He ran the plan over in his head again. When the engines were taken care of, he and Jamie would move the plane back out of the compound, turn it around and back it up so that the vehicle bay was as close to the interior of the compound as they could get it. Jackson and Tessa were charged with finding a vehicle of some sort suitable for moving Sam - he was still in very bad shape and couldn't walk. There was a vacancy in the vehicle bay where Jamie's Mustang used to be, so after they were all loaded up with Sam they would just drive right up into the plane while Mitch and Jamie covered them and then hope that they could find an open stretch of sand to take off on. 

Mitch was not too sure about being able to take off, and he said as much to Jamie as she was leaving the cockpit. "Mitch," she reassured him, "this thing landed with no runway, it can take off without one. I have been in worse places than this and made it out okay." She smiled and kissed him softly. "And this time I have you with me. It's going to be fine."

He cupped her face with both hands and kissed her back soundly. "I hope so. I have faith in you, Jamie Campbell."

Abe and Dariela he had tasked with a far more dangerous job. "I need the zombie dog, Abe. The one that died and came back as a hybrid. I need to figure out if the hybrids are turning the animals or of it's something else. And if they ARE turning the animals, how?" 

"That would be good information to have, Mitch," Abe agreed. "Should I get anything else?"

"Yeah. The soldier the dog killed, bring him too. Whatever is left of him, anyway."

***

Two hours and fifty five minutes left.

Mitch had been right, Jamie did have a gadget to clean the engines for her. A small robot on a tether, basically a combination fan/mop, ran into the engine compartments, blew out the dirt, rocks, any other debris that could be detrimental to them, then ran the 'mop' over the metal inside, cleaning the remaining dust out and greasing the interior so that the turbine blades would run smoothly. She tapped at the spare tablet she had activated to replace the one Jackson broke, her mind wandering as the robot did its job and she found herself thinking about Logan. He had been so many things to her - companion, conspirator, friend, lover, enemy - but he had never been who she really wanted. Had he known from the beginning no matter what he did she would never love him, never really belong to him? He had spent years of his life sharing her with a dead man, yet never complained, never even brought it up. How many nights had Mitch's ghost lay between them, keeping her forever apart, keeping Logan forever alone? Guilt began to eat at her and she squeezed her eyes shut tight to stem the tears that were threatening to overflow. "You don't have time for this now, Campbell," she muttered to herself, taking a deep shaky breath. "Save it for later."

"Save what for later?" Dear God, Mitch was the last person she wanted to see just at this moment, and she hastily wiped her eyes and turned her back to him, pretending to be busy. 

"Uh," she grasped for an answer as the cleaning gadget beeped at her, and she took the opportunity to cover up her emotions, pulling on its tether as she finished, "Putting this little guy away. I may need him again." 

"Uh huh," Mitch replied flatly. He wasn't fooled but to his credit he didn't push her, instead peering curiously at the mop/fan as she wound the tether up. "So I guess we're good here? I just got off the phone with Abe, they have Sam loaded up in one of the IADG golf carts, I guess it was all they could find."

"Well that doesn't sound very safe." 

He shrugged at her. "Since when have we ever been very safe?" 

Jamie chuckled. "Fair point."

An uneasy silence fell over them. Mitch wasn't a stranger to the emotional workings of women, but since dealing with them -women or emotions- had never been his forte he had never mastered the art of tactful handling. His footing with Jamie was still a little uneven after the Duncan fiasco and he didn't want to upset the peace they had made, he didn't want to be the darkness that swooped in and blotted out their moment of light, but he found his tongue moving before his brain could stop him and he blurted out, "I'm sorry about Logan."

It was the right thing to say. She rewarded him with a sad smile and a squeeze of the hand. "Me too." 

***

Moving the plane was easily accomplished, and Mitch was fairly impressed when Jamie whipped it around and backed it into the open, deserted compound yard. He gave her a low whistle as they left the cockpit and headed to the vehicle bay and said, "I bet you aced your parallel parking test in high school."

"I knocked over three cones and spilled my instructor's coffee in his lap," she said as they reached the top of the central staircase. She paused before taking a step down giving Mitch a teasing smile that nearly made his heart stop. "Super Jamie didn't come along until later."

He caught up to her halfway down the stairs. "Bruce Wayne didn't become Batman until he was in his mid-20's. Tony Stark didn't become Iron Man until his mid-30's and they are bona fide super heroes. Hey, now that I think about it, they were both millionaires who used their vast fortunes to fight crime and injustice. Sounds kinda familiar."

They reached the lab, footsteps clattering on the gleaming floor. Jamie moved to one of the portholes, peering out into the compound. She had managed to maneuver the plane so that the vehicle bay was only about thirty yards from the barrier doors that led to the interior and the infirmary, and she had angled it so that from this side of the fuselage she had a pretty good view of what was happening around them. "Oh my God." she murmured. 

Mitch didn't like the sound of that. "What is it?" he asked, as he joined her at the window. 

About a dozen razorbacks were milling around the compound, and when she looked up Jamie could see the shadows of several giant vulture hybrids circling, dark against the clear blue sky. "Oh look," Jamie said, her voice strained, "It's one of our dinosaur friends." A familiar, scaly green-brown head bobbed above the razorbacks and she added, "Welcome to Jurassic Park." 

Mitch grabbed his phone and hurriedly dialed Abe as he and Jamie both started racing toward the vehicle bay. "Hey, we've got company out here. You need to stay where you are until we can figure something out."

Abe's voice was worried on the other end of the line. "What kind of company?"

"Oh, just a few razorbacks and some dive-bombing vultures. And a dinosaur. Velociraptor I think. I don't know for sure, I'm not a paleontologist. Nothing we can't handle, though, just stay there until I call you." They had reached the bay, Jamie was already at the armory, unloading automatic weapons and ammo, and then she reached into the bottom of the armory and pulled out a big, heavy black case.

"Did you say dinosaur?" Abe's deep voice was incredulous but he recovered quickly. "We are running out of time. Dariela and I will come and help you clear out the hybrids. We must find the baby before it is too late." 

"Copy that." Mitch didn't like it, it wasn't part of the plan, but Abe was right, they were running out of time and there were a lot of hybrids out there. He took the assault rifle Jamie handed him and the extra ammunition, stuffing it into his jacket. "Five minutes, have everyone ready." He hung up the phone slipping it into his rear pocket, nodding at the case Jamie was opening and asked, "What's that?"

Jamie lifted out a long, gray object that looked like something halfway between a rifle and a water gun. It had a heavy black hose attached to the rear that connected to the backpack made of gas canisters that Jamie hefted onto her back, slipping her arms into the straps and settling the weight on her shoulders. "Flamethrower," she said with more than a little pride. "Israeli military. I won it from a Russian government official in a bet a few years ago. I've never had the opportunity to use it, but now seems like a pretty good time to try it out."

Jesus, she was glowing with excitement - and a little fear - and even though there wasn't time for it, wasn't room for the distraction, he couldn't stop himself from pulling her close, feeling the crush of her against him, smelling the grease from the engines still in her clothes and tasting the saltiness of her skin as he kissed her, free hand wound tightly in her hair, he didn't need to breathe, he just needed to drink her in as long as-

His phone rang shrilly, breaking the moment and he let go of her reluctantly, pulling his phone out. It was Abe, and he turned it on just as Abe was yelling, '-if you can hear us, we are being attacked! Mitch, Jamie, we are being attacked!" There were gunshots and screams and the phone went dead.

***


	3. Murphy's Law

MURPHY'S LAW

Murphy’s Law: Anything that can possibly go wrong, will.

They stood at the bay door, tense and on edge. Mitch pushed his glasses up on his nose for what felt like the thousandth time; fear had slicked him with a cold sweat and he shifted his feet impatiently, feeling a cold trickle run down his back as Jamie tapped at the plane's navigational tablet. "I'm setting the timer on the bay door to close five seconds after it opens," she explained, not missing his fretful agitation as she stowed the tablet in her jacket, "When we come back we don't want the plane overrun with hybrids." 

"Good thinking," Mitch replied tersely, "Snakes on a Plane was bad enough, Dinos on a Plane would just be ridiculous."

The ramp started to drop, hot afternoon sun beaming through the cracks as it descended. Jamie flipped the switch on the backpack supplying her flamethrower and ignited it; as the gap opened further she lowered protective goggles over her eyes. She could see several razorbacks turning to look at the plane and when three of them broke off and came towards her, fangs dripping as they snarled, she stepped off the edge of the ramp, squeezing the trigger until a spray of liquid fire erupted from the end of her gun, engulfing the charging hybrids in flames. They fell screaming, thrashing madly in agony. Mitch was at her side, rifle ready, but most of the creatures seemed disinclined to attack, instead running through the broken down doors of the interior, where the infirmary - and Clem and the others - had been. 

The last hybrid vanished through the doors, only the corpses of the three burned razorbacks remained, smoking gruesomely on the ground around the plane. The ramp had already raised itself, Jamie noted, and she sheathed the flamethrower in the rack on the canister backpack, raised her goggles up on her forehead and pulled her pistol, flicking the safety off and checking the clip. "Ugh," Mitch said as they ran toward the doors, "It's smells like someone's barbecuing gym socks. Reminds me of college." 

They reached the entrance to the interior of what had been Barrier Command- just a few short hours ago they had been celebrating in there, patting themselves on the back for a victory they hadn't actually won. Jamie's voice echoed in Mitch's ear, something she had said to him months ago - years ago? He was never really sure about his own timeline anymore- but she had been talking about losing to Reiden Global again after thinking they had found the cure and saved the world and she said, bitter and angry, "I was blisteringly naive, and it won't happen again." But it had, they had let down their guard, taken too many chances drunk on their own hubris and Abigail had used their mistakes to destroy them. Frustrated fury made his hands shake as Jamie motioned for him to flank the other side of the entrance; he moved where she wanted but he was detached, robotic - darkness be damned, he was going to exact retribution from Abigail Westbrook one day. Maybe not death, death was too easy and he was a scientist - he could come up with a much more horrible fate than just death. 

"Mitch!" Jamie barked sharply at him and he shook himself back to the present; she was looking at him with questioning concern as she said, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, fine, sorry," he said, swinging his rifle up and aiming it down the apparently deserted hallway. "The infirmary is down at the end, through double doors."

It was wide enough to drive a truck through and it stretched for fifty feet with offices and restrooms and storage closets every ten feet or so on both sides of the hall. At the end of the long corridor the hallway turned left in front of a set of double doors which appeared to be splattered with something dark and blood-like, making Mitch's stomach flip-flop with anxiety. Jamie sidled cautiously inside, passing a IADG golf cart with a extra long bed that was loaded with boxes of what looked like various medical supplies, a large black canvas bag and a man-sized bundle wrapped in a blue IADG infirmary blanket. Mitch peered cautiously over the edge of the bed, noted the bag and bundle and said, "This must be the cart they had loaded Sam on, because I think that blanket is my dead soldier and the bag is my new pet hybrid." 

"So they weren't in the infirmary," Jamie said, "and they abandoned the cart so they couldn't have gone far with Sam, where are they? What happened here?"

Mitch shook his head. He was barely keeping his panic under control. He'd only come to terms with the fact that he was an emotional being a few months before his "death", but in that short span of time he'd been subjected to losing Jamie (and finding her), losing the cure, losing Chloe, almost losing Clementine again and a hundred other moments that plucked at his sensitive heart; and while the others had all experienced the last ten years, had felt the time pass day by day, week by week, month by month, he'd been in stasis alone, experiencing his dreams and his memories. He'd only been post-tank Mitch for a few weeks, everything that happened ten years ago for everyone else was still fresh for him, still raw and new. And suddenly he had a grown daughter, and grandchild and an alter ego and Max was dead and there was Jamie (but not-Jamie) - it was a lot for someone who just started to allow himself to feel again to process. 

A door down the hall to their left opened, startling them both; they swiveled their guns up as Clem stuck her head out, sighing a great sob of relief when she saw her father and Jamie. "Dad!" she cried, looking out into the hall before running to them and letting her father grab her in a fierce hug. "We were so worried about you two!"

"Yeah," Mitch said hoarsely, reluctantly letting go of his daughter. "You had us a little worried too. What happened here? The last thing we heard was you were being attacked-"

"Come inside, more may be coming," Clem said, leading them into the room she had left and closing the door behind her. It was a nice office that had probably belonged to one of the IADG upper level staff; tasteful brown carpet and comfortable chairs around a huge mahogany desk; though at the moment Sam Parker/Connor Oz was leaking blood onto the very nice desk. He looked strained and tired and in pain but awake and lucid, which was a good sign. Jackson sat beside him, though not touching his son, and Mitch wondered vaguely if Jackson had told him the truth and then the idea struck him that he and Jackson were now grandfathers together and he choked down a snort at the thought. Tessa was by Jackson's side, eyes narrowed at Jamie as if she expected her to attack him again; she took a protective step closer to him as Jamie rolled her eyes and smirked back at her. Abe and Dariela stood by the door, smiling with relief as Jamie asked, "What happened here? Is everyone okay?"

"Yeah," Dariela said, motioning to Abe who had a large gash across his leg, "the hybrids attacked but just enough to get us out of the way. They didn't come after us once we shut ourselves up in here."

As she said it there was noise outside the door; Jamie and Mitch immediately raised their weapons but Abe stopped them, shaking his head. "They will pass in a moment," he whispered over the sound of hundreds of claws tapping on tile flooring. "This is the third group that has moved through, the first is what attacked us. I was loading Sam into the cart when they came, but only two of them came after us, the rest just padded down the hallway, past the infirmary."

"What about the blood?" Jamie asked.

"I heard Abe yell," Dariela explained, "So I came running out and one of them charged me. I shot it but it ran down the hallway and disappeared with the rest."

Abe added, "They didn't really try to come after me, it was like they were distracting me while the others fled."

Tessa spoke up. "There's an exit down that hallway," she said. "To the outside. That must be where they're going."

The unsuspecting outside world was about to be overrun with vicious, murderous hybrids because of Jackson. The unspoken accusation hung in the air like a lead balloon, and Mitch, who could sympathize with the mental miasma Jackson was dealing with did his best to let the air out but Dariela spoke first. "I'm glad everyone is okay," she said, "But we can finish the family reunion later. We have a baby to find in less than two hours, and I am pretty sure those aren't going to be the last hybrids that come through here and the next batch may not be so easy going."

Jamie exited the room first, pistol at the ready, Mitch at her back with the assault rifle. Mitch insisted that Clem stay next to him, at least until they got to the cart; Abe and Jackson were carrying Sam on a stretcher and once they got him loaded on top of the various boxes of supplies she was going to ride in the back to protect him for the short and hopefully uneventful ride to the plane. They manhandled him on the cart and Clem climbed on the back, balancing herself on the blanketed bundle as she asked, "What exactly am I sitting on?"

Abe smiled at her apologetically. "Your father wanted the soldier, Troy, who was killed by his own dog after it turned into a hybrid. I am sorry, I had nowhere else to put it. Him.”

Clem made a face but sat herself gingerly on the bundle.

Tessa clambered into the drivers seat, Jackson at her side. His eye was blackening nicely, and Tessa grinned and said, "Well, Dylan Green, I think we have had quite enough spice for a while."

Jackson smiled back, his eyes flickering to his son, who was being tended to by Clementine. "I agree. I'm ready to sit by a fireside and spin yarns to my grandson about how we survived the animal apocalypse."

Tessa leaned her forehead against his. “Do we survive?"

Jackson kissed her quickly. “Of course we do.”

They were ready to go. One hour and forty five minutes left. Jamie pulled out her tablet as Dariela said, “Jamie is going to open the bay door and as soon as it starts to move so do we," she said, "We have the flamethrower and so far the hybrids haven't been very aggressive so this shouldn’t be too difficult." She hesitated, looking at each one of them in turn. "I know it's only thirty yards and that doesn't seem like much but if anything goes wrong that ninety feet is going to feel like forever, so...be ready. Abe and I will flank the cart, and Mitch and Jackson, stay with Clementine and Sam." Jamie pulled her protective goggles back on and kicked on the flamethrower as the ramp on the plane started to descend.

The cart rolled slowly forward.

"Incoming!" Dariela yelled, and Jamie swung the flamethrower up at the snarling hybrids that appeared around the back of the plane to her right. Two more charged to the left at Dariela and Mitch; they filled the air with a hail of bullets as Jamie pulled her trigger, shooting a spray of fire at the oncoming beasts. The razorbacks went down, burning and twitching in agony, and Jamie spun around to check on Mitch and Dariela. 

Suddenly one of the dinosaur hybrids came roaring from out of nowhere, headed straight for Jamie. Her back was turned to it, but she saw Mitch’s look of fright and before he could shout a warning she started to turn but it was already on her, knocking her to the ground in a fury of white teeth and red blood.

Mitch screamed her name as she went down and he and Abe both raised their rifles, firing at the exposed side of the monster; it raised its scaly green head from Jamie's throat and Mitch nearly staggered with relief when he saw that she had the flamethrower barrel between her and the creature’s gnashing, grasping teeth. The dino lifted its ugly head and roared at them in anger; Jamie took the opportunity to pull a long, extremely sharp dagger from her boot and plunge it into the throat of the lizard, gagging as gouts of hot blood spouted all over her and the monster collapsed at her side, gurgling its last breath.

Mitch started to run for Jamie, but a scream from Clementine stopped him dead in his tracks. Troy, the dead IADG soldier, had risen from his shroud in the back of the cart, throwing Clem to the ground and shaking off the blanket as he stood. His dog had shredded him, and it was a grotesque composite of mangled bone and torn skin that roared with rage and reached through the cab to grab Tessa by the around the neck. She jerked the wheel in surprise, throwing off her demented attacker, but the sharp movement made the cart tip over, spilling Sam and the supplies onto the ground, still thirty feet from the plane. 

The zombie soldier leapt to his feet and targeted Sam, who was clawing frantically at the concrete trying to escape. Jackson leapt in between them and the creature punched him, hard, making him stagger backwards a few steps before recovering and launching himself at the monstrosity. The dead man seized him by the throat, squeezing and lifting him off of his feet as Tessa screamed and struggled to free herself from the wrecked cab.

Jamie had staggered to her feet, hampered by the canister backpack but in one piece so Mitch ran to his daughter who had scrambled to Sam’s side after he was thrown from the cart. The plane’s ramp was completely down so they grabbed Sam under the arms and dragged him the rest of the way to the plane, depositing him at the top of the vehicle bay. Mitch handed Clem his rifle and said, “Shoot anything that tries to get in this plane.”

Jackson’s fingers were scrabbling frantically at the cold hard hands of the dead man, legs kicking frantically and eyes bulging as he gasped for air. Abe and Dariela had their guns on him but Abe said cautiously, holding his hand out, “Hold your fire, we don’t want to hit Jackson.” 

Tessa was still trapped in the IADG cart and Mitch sprinted to help her as she struggled to squeeze through the crushed roll cage. They both looked up in horror as Abe shouted, “Jamie, no! What are you doing?”

Mitch looked up from the cart and froze with something between awe and terror. She could have been walking out of a Viking nightmare; red hair wild, covered in blood and gore and licked by flames – so beautiful and terrible he could hardly breathe – but with eyes so violent he shivered despite the heat. Darkness. 

She had maneuvered herself in front of the reanimated soldier, holding the barrel of the flamethrower close to its ruined face as it spat fire into air. “You know what this is, don’t you,” she asked, and as the creature’s eyes found the fire it shuddered. “Good. Let him go or I burn you.”

With Mitch’s help Tessa had freed herself and she ran toward Jackson but Jamie, without taking her eyes from the zombie soldier, pulled her pistol from her waistband and pointed it at Tessa. “Stop.”

“Jamie,” Mitch said, his gruff voice strained with fear as he inched closer to her, “what are you doing?”

There was loud squawking from above as four giant vultures abruptly appeared overhead and circled them; one dove at Jamie and she swiveled the flamethrower up at the bird, catching it in flames in midair and turning it into a flaming missile that smashed into the zombie soldier, driving him to the ground. He let go of Jackson who scrambled away, gasping and clutching at his throat; Abe and Tessa ran to meet him, and Jamie turned the flamethrower on the downed soldier as she shouted to Mitch, “Start closing the bay!”

He ran to the plane, feet pounding on the steel floor as he went up the ramp to the switch and pulled it as Jamie boarded; she stood at the edge, flamethrower ready, watching the hybrids burn as the ramp sealed them in. 

She dropped the flamethrower backpack from her shoulders with a grunt and pulled out the tablet. “I’m starting the takeoff sequence now,” she said, “if nothing goes wrong we should be in the air in three minutes.” 

The plane taxied away from the broken Barrier, into the flat expanse of the hybrid zone.

Sam was in pain and bleeding heavily; Abe, Dariela, and Clem lifted him as gently as they could and Clem said softly, “Don’t worry Sam. We are going to get you to the lab and two of the best doctors on the planet are going to take care of you.”

Sam lifted his head and looked at Mitch. “Yeah, but he’s a just a vet.”

Clementine laughed and kissed his forehead as they carried him toward the lab; with a glance at Jamie, Mitch followed them, allowing himself a small smile. Maybe the kid was alright. Jackson hobbled towards the lab, supported by Tessa. The zombie soldier had damaged him, he was limping heavily and his throat was an ugly dark purple; swallowing was going to be a painful challenge for a while.

Mitch was helping him up onto a table for an exam but when Jamie came in he left him to Tessa's tender ministrations. Jamie’s face was streaked with blood and dirt and it had congealed in her hair, twisting it into ropy snakes; Mitch brushed one gently away from her cheek and she said reassuringly, “Don’t worry, only a little of it is mine.”

He grabbed her into a hug, hard and long, and she felt him swallow thickly as he whispered into her ear, “So maybe you need a private exam?”

Sirens whooped, breaking the moment; Jamie broke away from him and pulled out the tablet. “It’s a proximity alarm,” she said, “something big is blocking the runway.”

They all moved to the plane’s portholes and Jackson said hoarsely, “Tessa, do you remember the unfriendly we caught in Portland?”

She nodded her head and whistled softly as she peered out of the window. “Looks like he has a family.”

A herd of giant wooly rhinoceros hybrids milled around them placidly, grazing, shaking their horrible horns and tusks and occasionally bellowing at each other- and completely blocking the stretch of clear land they needed for a runway.

Jackson shook his head in astonishment. “Well, they don’t seem aggressive, or overly interested in us, maybe this is just bad luck.”

“Murphy’s Law,” Mitch piped up, staring at the rhinos. “Anything that can possibly go wrong, will.”

Clem, still sitting by Sam’s side, said teasingly, “Max used to call it Mitch’s Law.” More than one of them snickered. 

“Yeah, well,” Mitch retorted, clearly annoyed, “He was usually what went wrong for me.”

“So what do we do?” Dariela asked. “We have ninety minutes until the cure for sterility is lost forever and a herd of prehistoric rhinos blocking our plane. Any ideas?”

“Maybe Jamie can blow the plane’s horn at them,” Mitch said sarcastically, ignoring the dirty look she threw his way.

Loud country music suddenly blared around the plane and Abe peered out of the western-facing portholes. “There are three armored vehicles coming this way from the west, from the hybrid zone.“ he said, “and they appear to be where the music is coming from.”

“If you can call country ‘music’,” Mitch said, looking out a porthole. “Apparently the rhinos have better taste than our company. They’re running away.”

It was true; the herd of prehistoric monsters was fleeing the music, streaming south along the barrier. The three trucks rolled to a stop and the music lowered as a man climbed down from the middle truck and approached the plane. Cowboy hat, spurs, boots, he looked like he’d just stepped out of a Marlboro ad. He came close to the plane, cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted in a broad Australian accent, “Halloo the plane! Open up, we’re friendly!”

***


	4. Friends in Low Places

FRIENDS IN LOW PLACES

I’m not big on social graces,  
Think I'll slip on down to the oasis.   
-Garth Brooks

One hour and thirty minutes left.

Clementine stayed in the lab with Sam but everyone else surrounded the plane’s main door, guns raised and ready for their visitor. The man who stepped through the plane's hatch could have been anywhere from forty to seventy, iron gray hair peeked out from beneath the brim of his cowboy hat but there were few lines on his face. he was big and burly like a bear but lean and hard, no fat anywhere on him. He wore jeans with leather chaps, intricately stitched cowboy boots, a plain blue workshirt covered with a worn denim jacket...and a fancy, pearl-handled six shooter hung from his hip, Flanked by two men in an eclectic mix of military and western clothing, he didn't seem disconcerted at all to be greeted by six people bristling with loaded weapons all pointed at him and he raised his hands cooperatively and grinned, showing even, white teeth. "G'day folks,” he said in a thick Australian accent, inclining his head to Mitch who was the closest one to him. "Morris Brown, formerly of the Royal Australian Regiment, 4th Battalion, currently of the SoCal Extract/Evac Company, at your service." He got a good look at Jamie, covered in blood and filth, and Jackson, whose eye had blackened magnificently and whose throat was ringed with darkening bruises. "Looks like you folks had a bit of a scrap.”

Jamie snorted. “That's an understatement.”

Jackson eyed Morris Brown closely and said in his gravelly, injured voice, “I’ve heard of you. Your company did the San Diego job a couple of years ago. That was some nice work." He lowered his gun, and the others did too, the tension easing in the room and Brown dropped his hands to sides.

Tessa said, "Impressive work, you mean." She explained to the others. “They evacuated five thousand people in one group, walked them 350 miles through hybrid infested desert and only lost one person- to appendicitis. That's the stuff of legends.”

Brown looked pleased at the praise and rocked back on his heels. "Yeah, that was one bugger of a run. Took two months to get ‘em to the safe zone, razorbacks attacking every few days." He turned to Jackson. "But you're a bit of a celebrity yourself, mate. I know who you are, Dylan Green. Number one evac specialist north of San Francisco, though I think your pet lions give you a bit of an advantage.” He glanced around the interior of the plane with delighted curiosity. “I don’t suppose they are with you now?"

"The lions didn't have enough frequent flier miles," Mitch interjected impatiently. "Not to be rude, but we are kind of on a tight schedule, soo…”

“Oh, right,” Brown said, not seeming offended in the least. He turned and nodded to one of his men, who disappeared back out of the plane. "We're on our way back from a run and well, there's strange things going on in the hybrid zone." He scratched up under his hat at his cropped gray hair. “I maybe saw the most bizarre of all a few hours ago...anyhow it's something we need to look into but we picked up a, uh, passenger that isn’t suited to fast, hard travel in a truck caravan. I was hoping we could leave it with you folks...” he trailed off as the man reappeared, holding a tiny bundle that suddenly let out a squalling scream.

There was stunned silence for a second. then Mitch handed Jamie his rifle and with a happy sob took his grandson in his arms. Relief swept like a wave over them all, suddenly they surrounded baby Sam, laughing and smiling with the utter joy of his unbelievable presence. Clementine came racing down the staircase from the lab, having heard her son's cries; everyone fell back and let her take her son from his grandfather in her trembling hands, hugging him tightly as Mitch held them both in a protective embrace. Jamie sidled away but one of Mitch's hands caught hers and pulled her into their family circle, though she resisted slightly he was insistent and she gave in, letting his arms encircle her too as she hugged Clem and smiled over baby Sam.

Morris Brown was taking in this scene with keen interest, and he waggled his bushy eyebrows at Jackson and said, "I guess you lot don't find a baby as strange as we do.”

Jackson was smiling happily, tears in his eyes and he shook his head at Brown and said hoarsely, “We suddenly don't have such a tight schedule. How about a drink and you tell us how you ended up with the baby?”  
***

Brown set one of his five men on guard, to watch out for hybrids- or other things- and the rest of them retired to the bar for a drink. Jamie excused herself after one; Clem had taken Baby Sam to be with his father in the lab after Mitch examined him (and after Abe administered the sterility cure injection); Jackson/Dylan and Tessa were discussing evacuation runs and other business she didn't particularly care about too much with their visitors, though Abe and Dariela were extremely interested as they discussed tactics and various plans that worked, or didn’t. The sticky dinosaur blood that covered her was getting unbearable, itchy and crackling against her skin and when she moved her right arm there was a worrisome tugging sensation that she was afraid was a deep cut that her clothes had dried to. She was brutally sore and wanted nothing more than to peel the filthy clothes off and climb into a steaming hot shower. Mitch started down the hall after her and she almost told him to stay put but then she realized he didn’t particularly want to listen to tactical Evac stories, and he didn’t want to intrude on his daughter's newly reunited family- he wanted to be with her. She waited for him to catch up and teased, “Time for my private exam, doctor?”

He smiled but his eyes were serious. "Actually, Miss Campbell, it is. I’ve noticed the way you’ve been moving your right arm and favoring your right side. I know am just a vet,” she snickered at that, "but I think I am qualified to check you out.” 

They needed to talk, she knew, needed to work out some of the events of the last 72 hours; Max, and Logan, and discuss some things that had been said, or maybe hadn't been said, but now wasn't the time. She was tired, sore, and they were still both too warm with the residual happiness of baby Sam to start dissecting the darkness between them.

Mitch saw her hesitation and guessed the reason behind it truthfully, he didn’t really want to hash it out now either, he was too confused, too amazed, too unsettled… just too much. “I don’t –“ he started, then took her hand and said, “I just want to make sure you’re okay, Jamie.”

Taking it as a promise, she opened the door to her room and let him in.  
***

Mitch rejoined the others in the bar a short while later. Jamie hadn't had any serious injuries, the worst was the laceration she had feared, a deep cut in her shoulder from the dagger sharp talons of the dinosaur. Adrenaline had kept her from feeling it, but she had felt it well enough when Mitch pulled the clotted, matted cloth from it with a sickening ripping sound, making her pale as fresh blood seeped from the gash. She also had a darkening bruise from her right armpit to her hip, where she had landed when the dino attacked her but otherwise she seemed fine and as promised, when he had determined that she didn't need any serious doctoring, he left her to it with a kiss and a promise to let him disinfect the gash after her shower.  
The conversation in the bar had shifted to different hybrids they had seen recently, and the talk had turned from somewhat jovial to something more subdued and tense. Apparently there were more terrible creatures out there than they had already dealt with, and Mitch blanched at the mention of spider hybrids the size of golden retrievers, massive eight foot tall goats that had five foot long horns and razor sharp hooves, and at least one woolly mammoth, which had used its massive tusks to knock a locomotive off of the tracks outside of Los Angeles. It was somewhat frightening to consider that six-foot tall, vicious Cretaceous dinosaurs weren’t the worst they were going to face as Abigail’s creatures roamed freely into North America.

Once he had poured himself a drink and taken a seat with the others, the conversation changed as Mitch said. "So, Crocodile Dundee, tell me how you figured out country music scares the monsters away.”

Brown just laughed. "Crocodile Dundee. You Americans are so unoriginal. 'Throw another shrimp on the barbie’ and all that.” He squinted hard at Mitch, then shrugged. “To be honest, Dr. Morgan, we have no idea how it works. We just happened to luck into the discovery.” He took a deep swallow of the golden amber liquid in his glass and settled back into his seat. “We don't only do evac work, though that is our main focus. We also, eh," he searched for a delicate term, “clean up after the survivors have been evacuated.”

“Loot, you mean.” Dariela snapped. Brown only shrugged again. “If that's what you like to call it, mate. One man's trash is another man's treasure. Anyway, about a week ago we were cleaning a cabin we found in Nevada outside some desert town called Rachel. Wasn't much in it, but Chuck here," he motioned to one of his men, “found some little ipod type thing and snagged it, thinking there might be some good music on it. Turns out there wasn’t, just that terrible song on a loop, over and over and over." He shook his fist at the sky and said, “I’ve got friends in low places too, mate! Such a bloody come down. We were in one of the trucks and we came on a herd of those goat hybrids and Chuck was so mad at the song he was about to throw the damn thing out when all of a sudden the goats started to run. Away. Now, in our experience those stubborn, canty headed bastards will charge every time, but while that bloody awful music was playing, they ran.

“We experimented. Cut the song off, they charged us, turned it on, they stopped in their tracks and skedaddled the other way. So we tried it on the next hybrid we met, a razorback. Ran. Vulture, flew away." He grinned, his hatless gray head shining in the plane's soft light. "It's a terrible price to pay, but for those we love, we sacrifice!" He guffawed and gulped the rest of his drink down, motioning to Mitch to refill it.

Mitch took his glass, rose and went to the bar, but he stopped short of pouring the whisky. “I owe you,” he said, inclining his head gratefully towards Brown, “for bringing the baby back to us -and l still want to know how that came about - but I think if you let me study that device with the song on it, I can figure out why it repels the hybrids and maybe you won't ever have to hear that song again,” he shrugged, “Or at the least, maybe I can change the song.”

“That in itself would be a relief, my friend." Brown said, and Mitch smiled as he handed him his drink.

***  
They moved the party to the lab, after Mitch saw Clem and Sam into his bedroom with the baby. Sam was still in rough shape but seeing his son and spending some quiet time with Clementine had done wonders for him, and the lab was too cold and uncomfortable for someone trying to rest. Jamie rejoined them, clean and fresh and creamy white in the glow of the lab's lights and Mitch was gratified to see her in somewhat casual clothing - in his mind he characterized it as ‘Early Jamie', faded jeans and a cute t-shirt and a light sweater -and she hadn't done her hair, it was tousled and curled and Mitch wanted nothing more in the world than to twist one of those curls in his fingers, pull it down and let his hand graze her cheek...but his imagination was cut off as Morris Brown whistled slowly at Jamie and said, "Well, we are officially a part of the jet set! Pun intended, of course! Jamie Campbell, of one of my favorite authors of one of my favorite novels.” He was quite a few drinks in, and he gave Jamie a friendly leer as he said, “I didn’t recognize you before when you were so...dirty," and winked, taking her hand, bending low and kissing her knuckles softly.

Mitch rolled his eyes loudly and Jamie withdrew her hand firmly with her ‘celebrity smile', the one she always used on talk shows and interviews and with overbearing fans. Mitch recognized it at once, how many times had he seen her use it when weaseling information out of someone or dealing with idiot officials who couldn't be handled by anyone else? lt was another glimpse of the old Jamie, and Mitch found himself feeling grateful that she was still...her. 

"Thank You," she said to Brown, then pointedly joined Mitch at his computer and took his hand, looking down at what he was working on.

Morris Brown chuckled and took another drink. “Aye, you're a lucky man, Dr. Morgan," he said, slapping his hand on his thigh. "No offense meant Miss Campbell. And you’re still my favorite author." He leaned sharply forward and said to Jackson/Dylan, "She may be the writer, but now I want you to tell me a story.”

Jamie stayed next to Mitch as he worked on the device Brown had given them. It was connected to one of their diagnostic computers and he ran a variety of different tests on it as Morris Brown listened to Jackson/Dylan and Abe take turns telling him about Abigail and the hybrids, New York, the volcano, Clem's miracle baby and the cure for sterility, and the breach in the barrier and their escape, though they left out Jackson's involvement both as her brother and as the one who drove the plane through the wall.

Well," Brown said, his deep Aussie accent broadened by alcohol, "I told you I had seen some strange things. About four hours before we found you, we came across the herd of rhino hybrids you folks acquainted yourselves with earlier. They were acting fairly bizarre, all standing in one place, looking the same direction. No panic, no snorting, no bellowing, not even when we started to drive around them, Then we saw a jeep parked at the edge of the herd, and a sheila, right up close, using some kind of hand signals and be damned if the rhinos weren't behaving as if they knew what she was saying!”

The crew all exchanged looks as Morris continued, "Well, we got up to the jeep before she noticed us, close enough for me to notice a baby seat in the back. Funny how baby seats never caught my eye before but I guess after you haven’t seen an ankle biter in a decade those kind of things look out of place. Anyway, she finally saw us and she didn’t bat an eye as she waved her hands and those damn monsters came charging at us so fast Chuck almost didn't hit play." He paused and threw a toothy grin at Chuck, who answered. "But l did, and those sumbitches wheeled around so quick they almost trampled the lady where she stood.”

Morris Brown took over. "Seemed like the music was hurting her too, she grabbed her head like it was about to bust but then again, maybe she just doesn’t like country music. But here's where the craziest part comes in. She was too far from her jeep, and she seemed pretty surprised that the beasties were running away such a hurry. She got a look at our arsenal bearing down on her so she made some kind of sign and one of those big bastards came back to her, let her climb on it and she rode away on it!” He shook his head as if he still couldn't believe what his own eyes had seen. "Craziest damn thing I’ve ever seen. We did a quick go over of the jeep and didn't find anything but well, the baby. We had figured on taking it to the Barrier and leaving it, but since you say they’ve evacuated –“ he shrugged and took another swallow of whisky.

Suddenly Mitch broke in. "Hey, Ja- uh, Dylan, could you come over here for a sec?" Brown didn't miss Mitch's mistake and his keen eyes suddenly narrowed as Jackson rose and joined Mitch at his computer. He had a screen up and Jamie peered over their shoulders as he pointed to two parallel, wavy lines that intersected at uniform points, "This look familiar to you?”

Jackson looked up at him incredulously. "That looks just like the combination of frequencies Abigail used to make the beacons, hers and mine, but opposite ranges, So instead of drawing the hybrids-“

“They repel them." Mitch finished, halfway between triumph and jealousy. “It’s genius, l don’t know why think of it before.” He beamed at Jamie, who squeezed his hand as he said, "I can isolate the frequencies and we can play it from anything that can broadcast. Looks like we may have a new line of defense.”  
***

Everyone had gone to bed except the two of them; Morris Brown and his men were sprawled on various couches throughout the plane and the others had gone to their rooms. Mitch had isolated the repellant frequency from the music and had it on a loop that was silent to the human ear but would hopefully keep hybrids away and Jamie had set proximity alarms on every entrance to the plane so everyone felt reasonably secure. Having six extra, heavily armed people on board for the night made it feel a little less worrisome too. They sat close together at the bar, nursing what was left of a bottle of vodka. Other than the impersonal exam earlier, and his quick, post-shower dressing of her wound, it was the first time they had been alone together in what felt like weeks, though it had only been little more than a day.

Jamie could feel him steeling himself up to say something and she was pretty sure she knew what it was going to be. As much as he had tried to make her feel better before, trying to claim darkness for himself, she knew he really wasn't accustomed to ruthless Jamie. Single-minded Jamie, yes, she'd always been that, but his brilliant brain was having trouble processing what ten years of bleak disappointment and pain had done to her. For years revenge had been her only motivating factor, in truth, years before she even met Mitch revenge had been her motivator but she'd had hope then, hope that things would work out in the end, hope that the little guy would win, and even hope that she and Mitch could make some kind of life together after the animal apocalypse. Then Mitch was gone, and she had hope that she could take care of Clementine the way he had wanted, hope that she could keep some part of him alive in herself through his daughter. Then Max took Clem and she had nothing. Logan hadn’t been, would never have been enough for her, so vengeance had filled that hole in her heart and she didnt know if she could make room in it again for something so weak and fickle as hope.

“So what was that out there?” He finally asked, his hand cupping her cheek, gently but firmly, she wasn’t going to look away.

She did anyway. and he let his hand fall, picking up his drink instead as she answered innocently, "What was what?"

He wasn’t going to deal with her bullshit tonight, and he rolled his eyes as if to say, really? "Didnt we just have a whole conversation about darkness? I think kicking Jackson in the face and threatening to burn him alive is a bit dark, even for you.”

“I wasn’t going to burn Jackson," she scoffed, though she couldn't deny the kick in the face so she took the easy one first. “l was threatening to burn the zombie because they are afraid of fire, which worked by the way.”

“No, it didn't. What worked was the flaming Thanksgiving turkey smashing into it." He had her there, and she leaned slightly away in irritation, pursing her lips and rearranging her socked feet on the barstool railing. Mitch didn't miss her reaction, and he pressed his advantage. “And what made you think fire would work on a zombie?”

Already annoyed at him, she rolled her eyes so hard she was afraid she'd strained her optic nerve. "Hello? I grew up in Louisiana? Bayous?Voodoo? Zombies? Didn't you spend a year there?”

"Studying giant river rats, not the undead.” He finished his drink, poured himself another and topped Jamie's off with the remainder of the bottle, plopping it loudly on the back of the bar. "Need to get some more of this." He sighed, swirling his drink in the bottom of his glass and deciding to let her off the hook for now said instead, "l could be studying the undead right now, but we left them in the compound. Not that I could do much with the soldier, since I think he's been barbecued beyond use,” he looked emphatically at Jamie, eliciting a snort of laughter she tried to suppress, "but l could still learn something from the dog.”

She swallowed the last of her drink in one gulp, jumped up from the barstool and said, "Well, lets go get it then." He looked at her blankly and she said, "The dog. It's still there in the compound, right? I mean, where would it go?"

He took another sip and looked sideways at her, then down at her feet. "Uh huh. You going in your socks or are you gonna put on some fuzzy slippers first?”

The laugh was real, warm and honeyed and rich and it sent shivers down his spine as the mood subtly shifted between them. "Maybe we can wait until tomorrow," she said, her voice suddenly husky and low, stepping between his knees she leaned into him as he bent to meet her lips with his. Electricity surged between them, fusing them together, all sparking neurons and melding molecules; her hands burned against his thighs, through the thick material of his jeans and in the desperate reaches of his lizard brain he wondered vaguely if she planned on burning him alive, though at the moment he didn't really care if she did. He buried his hands in her hair, pulling her closer, needing her closer and she responded, tightening her body against his because she needed him too.

They finally surfaced for air, and Mitch stood. holding her to him and brushing tousled tendrils of her hair away from her face. "Uh, my room is currently being used as a nursery ..sooo, think maybe l can crash with you tonight?" he asked gruffly.

She answered him breathlessly, running her fingers over his stubbly cheek, “I think that can be arranged.”  
"Afterwards you can tell me all about zombies," he said, lowering his head to nibble sharp kisses at the soft skin of her throat. “We have to keep up our reputation for lively pillow talk.”  
***

Here, darkness was good. Here, darkness kept them safe, hidden from the outside world and its monsters; it hid their scars in shadows, even as they bared themselves completely. Here, in the darkness, it was just the two of them, together.  
***


	5. Spoonman

SPOONMAN

  
All my friends are skeletons  
(They beat the rhythm with their bones)  
~Soundgarden

  
Bright morning sunlight spilled through the portholes, dappling the bed where they lay entangled in the soft sheets. Mitch was propped up on his side, supporting himself with one arm while the other traced lazy circles on the flat plane of Jamie's stomach. She was watching him through half-closed eyes, hoping he'd shift the circles a few inches higher-or lower. They had only been together a few times since his return from the dead and most of those had been hurried, hidden affairs; even when they did take more than a few rushed moments he never stayed the night in her room, or she in his. They weren't a secret, everybody knew they were... something, but it just felt too weird to be so openly girlfriend/boyfriend-y around everyone else. It was easier to slip back into their rooms in the dark; neither wanted to face anyone on an early morning walk of shame, even if it was a short one. This was the first time she had woken up beside him, wrapped in his musky morning scent, feeling the scratchy stubble of his chin rubbing the back of her neck where the sun warmed it. Sure, he'd had no room to go back to since it was currently occupied by his daughter and grandson, but she knew he wouldn’t have gone anyway because this was just another slow step in their journey to find something like a normal relationship in this not-normal world.

  
She could hear the rumble of the plane wakening; feet pattered past their door, sleepy voices grumbled down the hall, and they could hear the unfamiliar voices of Morris Brown and his men stirring downstairs. They would have to get up soon, there were things to do and a world to try and save but for the moment she content to just be with him, the man she thought she'd lost forever. Mitch.

  
His lazy circles had moved lower, and she took in a sharp breath as he whispered in her ear, "You’re beautiful, Jamie Campbell," and kissed the tender flesh at the base of her neck. "Your skin is like satin, so soft so white," he nuzzled between her breasts, making her squirm with anticipation. "I had so many dreams about us," he murmured into her belly, his beard black against her paleness, and she slid her hands into his hair, groaning softly. His next words were buried in the area between her thighs but she understood him well enough, and she answered him with her body and soul.  
***

  
Sated and sweaty, they lay quietly together for a few more minutes. She could tell Mitch shared her aversion to leaving this room; he made no move to leave their nest either, but he looked over at her with sad reluctance. "I guess we'd better..." he motioned at the door.

  
“Yeah," Jamie replied. "I guess so." She sat up on the edge of the bed, loathe to leave him but then a scent wafted up to her, and she took in a deep breath. "Do you smell something?"

  
“ls that...bacon?" he asked, sniffing the air. "l didn't think there was any food on this plane. Just alcohol."

  
Jamie shook her head. "Grocery shopping isn't really my thing.”

  
They dressed hurriedly, both nearly salivating at the smell of bacon that had been joined by the overpowering scent of fresh, strong coffee but Mitch stopped Jamie at the bedroom door, kissed her thoroughly, then opened the door and strolled boldly from her room in the clothes he had been wearing the night before, keeping her hand firmly in his.  
***

  
Morris Brown and his men had supplied the foodstuffs. "Your good luck, folks,” Morris said, beaming over the huge spread of bacon, eggs, fried potatoes, butter, bread, cheese, apples and bananas.

  
“Since we were just on a run back to HQ we resupplied at Pueblo, the border town, and stocked up on plenty of fresh tucker! A soft place to sleep inside after weeks on the road is no small gift,” he patted one of his obviously hungover men on the leg and added, “and we drank enough of your liquor last night. I'd say this is a fair trade!”

  
Drawn by the scent of food, everyone had made their way into the kitchen and they were busily loading up plates. Jamie and Mitch found themselves suddenly ravenous, and as they both piled food on their plate they caught each other's eyes and shared a smile. Morris Brown, who never missed a thing, saw their exchange and, noting that Mitch was clad in the previous night's attire, guffawed, “And some of us worked up mighty appetites in other ways, from the look -and the sound- of it!" Clementine didn't bother to suppress her laugh at her father's barely shamefaced eyeroll as Jamie flamed bright red and choked on the bite of bread she had just taken.

  
"The walls are very thin,” Abe said apologetically, patting Jamie on the back until she stopped coughing.

  
After everyone had eaten their fill, Mitch sighed and stood addressing Morris Brown. ”Okay, before you guys head back out on the dusty trail, I need something and I think you can help us. Dylan," he almost stumbled on the name again but caught himself, "told you about the dog that was killed by a hybrid, then came back from the dead as a hybrid? Well, his corpse is back at the IADG compound at the Barrier, and I need it to study how they are turning animals into hybrids.”

  
Brown shrugged. "Well, mate, that seems easy enough. Well use your little frequency doohickeys, breeze right in, breeze right out.” He elbowed one of his men in the ribs. "Maybe pick up some, uh, supplies, while we're there, boys?”

  
"Yeah," Mitch said slowly, "Nothing around here is ever easy. There’s a catch. I also need a fresh hybrid to compare the dogs makeup with. So, we have to tum off the doohickey to get a hybrid to come to us.”

  
The revelation didnt seem to bother Morris Brown in the slightest. “Well, that does put a bit of sand in the gears, doesn’t it?" He glanced at his men. "But I think we can handle it.”  
***

  
They only had one vehicle in the bay, one of the armored SUVs so Jamie, Mitch. Abe and Dariela climbed in while Jackson and Tessa rode with Morris Brown. Mitch had programmed everyone's phone with the frequency, so they only had to open up a music app and press play for their own personal monster repellant, The drawback was it used battery power like crazy, and the most a phone tended to last while using it was fifteen minutes, so it was only for when things got really close. The plan was to ride in with the frequency blasting from one of the trucks, grab the dog and whatever supplies and data from IADG they could and then turn off the frequency until a hybrid came close enough to catch or kill.

  
Mitch was driving and as they pulled off of the ramp into the desert he turned on his radio, popping in a CD and cranking the volume up. _Spoonman, come together with your hands, save me, I’m together with your plan, save me…_

  
“You’re supposed to be playing the frequency, Mitch," Abe yelled over the music.

  
"I layered it under my favorite CD," Mitch shouted back. "Now I always have a reason to blast Soundgarden!" He sang along, drumming on the steering wheel as they bounced over the rough terrain and Jamie sang with him, though she had a terrible voice. He heard her and turned to give her a wink. _Save me.._. Chris Cornell sang, and Mitch squeezed her hand discreetly across the front seat.

  
They rolled into the compound, deserted and looking much as it had when they left it the day before. The bodies of the razorbacks, dinosaur and vulture still lay on the ground and a blackened man shaped lump of charcoal lay in the middle like the most gruesome centerpiece ever.

  
The Australian's trucks drove into the compound behind them and Morris Brown whistled under his breath as he climbed out and looked around at the carnage. "You lot did have a scrap, eh?”

  
Mitch ran to the spilled IADG golf cart and found the dog, still in the black bag. He opened it to be sure and gagged as the smell of rotting meat and maggots rolled up out of the leather while Jamie covered him with her pistol. Brown and his men and Abe, Jackson, Dariela and Tessa ran into IADG headquarters, Brown and his men grabbing whatever supplies they could and Jackson and the others grabbing computers and any kind of data they could from the offices. The trucks and the SUV were loaded down and they all gathered around, looking at the scope of the damage the plane had done.

  
“Okay, time to turn the frequency off," Mitch said, and Chuck, Morris Brown's man, turned of his broadcast system and they all waited. Mitch had a tranquilizer gun but everyone else carried live ammo. "Remember, we need to try to get one alive.”

  
It didnt take long. There was a loud, roaring shriek and three of the raptor dinos came streaking into the compound. All three targeted the truck that had been blasting the frequency, and before anyone could react, they had dragged Chuck down and mauled him while he screamed. A fusillade of bullets flew into the hybrid pack and as blood and glass flew in all directions the dinos fell dead and Morris Brown ran to his comrade's side. It was too late, he was a lifeless, mangled, bloody mess, and Brown hurriedly flipped the frequency back on before dropping to the side of his dead friend.

  
The elation from earlier was gone, and as Brown tended to his downed man, Jamie and Mitch quietly used the winch on the front of the SUV to pull one of the dead dinosaurs onto the roof rack. Mitch felt sick about Chuck, partly because it had been his idea that cost the man his life, but also because he couldn't help but remember how close Jamie had come to that same fate the day before. He tried not to look at the dead man as Brown and another of his men gently placed him in the back of one of their trucks because all he could see was Jamie in his place, her ivory skin red with her own blood, her beautiful face savaged and her throat ripped out, her warm hands as cold as marble-

  
There was a loud scream and Mitch whirled around in time to see the dead man lunging from the back of the truck at Brown, who stumbled back in terror as the bloody, butchered man fell on him in a fury. Mitch raised his tranquilizer gun and ripped off a shot that caught Chuck in the neck, and with one more mighty roar of rage he fell to the ground.  
***

  
Mitch stayed in the lab for hours, running test after test on the dead dinosaur. Everyone left him to it except Jamie, who stayed behind to help him when she could and be an encouraging presence when she couldn't. The Australians cooked a somber lunch which they downed with alcohol, and it wasn't the first time Jamie was thankful for having a full bar; their recently un-deceased friend was locked firmly in the cell in the belly of the plane and his frequent screams and roars were disheartening to his former mates. Thankfully he was quiet unless someone went down to the cell, which Mitch had done a few times to try and collect samples but then his shrieks would shake the plane with their ferocity.

  
Jamie brought Mitch a plate from the kitchen, but he didn't want to eat. He seemed agitated and ran his hands through his hair making it stand out wildly. "See this molecular structure here?" he pointed to a compound on the screen. "This is from the dinosaur hybrid. This is my signature,” he said, pointing to a series of atoms. "I started using it in a high school science fair as an inside joke for my- for Max. But I didn't design this. This is from my brain but not from me, so it had to be Duncan. And he's added an extra bond just here-“ pointed at the screen, "though it doesn't change the function of this compound at all.”

  
“So Duncan created these hybrids in the Blue Diaspora program and he signed them with your signature, which would be why the people who took you out of the tank thought you knew what it was. And he added a small variation into your signature. So what does that mean?”

  
He threw his hands in the air. "Why the difference? He could have just tagged it as me and left it at that. Why extra bond?" Mitch punched a button and another compound molecule sprang to the screen. "This is from the vulture we got a while ago. Here's the same signature molecule, just like mine, but with another variation. A different variation." He distractedly pushed his glasses back up on his nose. “I think each these variations come together at a molecular level to do something big, but l don’t know what. I need blood from every different variety of hybrid she's created to put this puzzle together."

  
Jamie took a step back, looking horrified. "What? Mitch, that’s impossible, I mean we don't even know how many different hybrids she’s made!”

  
“Yeah, that's just the first of our problems. But l do have some good news. Our zombie friend, Chuck, he doesn't have any kind of molecular variation, but he wasn't created by Abigail," he inclined his head, “at least, not first hand. But the saliva from our hybrid buddy here," he motioned to the dead dinosaur on the table, "has a sort of catalyst, a large amount of Reactive Oxygen Species- those are free radical molecules- that speed the regeneration of cells, hence our ‘resurrected' dead. But I tested Chuck himself, and he doesn’t have that extra serving of ROS molecules so he can't turn anything into a zombie, which means neither can any other zombie animal. Theoretically.”

  
“Luckily, Mitch Morgan's theories are usually right," Jamie said putting her hand gently over his. "And some good news is better than nothing. We need to tell the others about this.”

***  
Jamie called the others to the lab, and they all crowded in around Mitch’s computer bank as he explained what he had found, though he left out the Duncan aspect in front of Brown and his men. "So, basically, if I am going to solve the hybrid puzzle I need blood samples, or even better, fresh samples, of every hybrid Abigail has created. So far we know that is razorbacks, vultures, woolly rhinos, goats, mammoths, spiders and velociraptors. We have the vulture and the dino, so we need a razorback, rhino, goat, mammoth and spider sample.”  
"And snakes." Jamie added. "Giant invisible snakes.”  
“Right. And snakes." He gave her a sideways look and said so that only she could hear, "Don't know how we forgot that since one ate you." He turned back to the entire group. "There may be more since we don't know how many hybrids she's created, so it's important that we know about any new variety.”

  
"Well, then this is good news, l guess," Dariela said, breaking in. "I intercepted a report of a hybrid polar bear creating havoc in Alaska. Supposedly it's as big as a car."

  
“Look," Jackson said, standing up to face them all. "We are still under a time crunch here. The more of Abigail’s hybrids that make it through the barrier into North America, the more zombie animals going to be facing. I say we split up. Mitch, you and the others take the plane and go to Alaska, Tessa and l will join Morris and his men in tracking down the hybrids that we can and getting samples." He looked at Brown. "lf you are willing."

  
Morris nodded. "You betcha, mate. I want a shot at that shiela responsible for this mess. And for Chuck."

  
Dariela looked lovingly at Abe, then squared her shoulders and said to Jackson, “I am going with you. I'm more of a soldier than a scientist, and something tells me you’re gonna need my help."

  
Jackson nodded, and Abe and Dariela disappeared to say a private goodbye.  
Jackson, Tessa and Morris Brown put their heads together to start planning and Mitch cleared his throat. "One more thing," he said, motioning towards the kitchen. "Could you leave us some of that bacon?”


	6. Nothing Burns Like the Cold

NOTHING BURNS LIKE THE COLD

Nothing burns like the cold. But only for a while. Then it gets inside you, starts to fill you up, and after a while you don’t have the strength to fight it.   
~George R R. Martin, A Game of Thrones

The three armored trucks drove northwest across rough terrain, and Jackson, Tessa and Dariela bounced along with Morris Brown in the rear of the caravan, heading towards an area the Australian knew to be rife with hybrids. Mitch had rigged a cooler in the back of the truck to keep the blood samples cold and safely cushioned, but even with refrigeration they would only be good for Mitch's purposes for a week so they were to head north, collecting what samples they could, and rendezvous with the others at an abandoned airstrip in San Francisco in six days so Mitch could do what he could with the samples he had.

It felt good to be back out on a safari and Jackson was honest with himself also glad to get away from Jamie- and Mitch, whose decision to let Jamie out of the cell without consulting anyone else was a clear delineation between the two of them and the rest of the team. Mitch was always going to side with Jamie, and Jackson didn’t trust Jamie, she was cold-blooded, dangerous, a liability. She didn’t care who her schemes hurt, who they put in danger. She supposedly cared for Mitch but she'd let a dangerous psychopath inhabit his mind in order to commit a murder, he thought she'd cared about him but she'd still let her novel expose him as Robert Oz's son and he'd had to leave his life behind to go into hiding. He hated leaving Sam behind and his grandson, and he ached to tell his son the truth about them but Sam wouldn't believe him now. Maybe he never would, but he was going to let the boy heal before opening up new wounds.

“So, Dylan, Green," Brown said to Jackson, beside him in the passenger seat, "there's just the four of us now so no worries. Tell me the truth- that's not really your name, is it?”

Jackson just laughed, though Tessa could see his shoulders stiffen from the backseat. "Well, yeah, it is," Jackson answered, "What makes you think it's not?"  
Morris Brown was shrewd, no doubt about it. “It started knocking about my noggin when I recognized Miss Campbell. As l said before I’m a big fan of her novel, mostly because after my experiences in Australia during the animal uprising l felt the ring of truth about it, knew that she wasn't just writing about the damn thing, she had lived what she was writing. Now, if know women, the female lead in the novel is most likely based on Miss Campbell herself, and here she is, on a fancy laboratory plane, with Dr. Mitch Morgan, who just happens to be a scientist - and her love Interest- so he of course would be the veterinary pathologist in the book. Mrs. Kenyatta," he nodded at Dariela in the backseat, “strikes me as the lady Army Ranger who married Mr. Kenyatta the safari guide. So, that leaves you, Tessa Williams, who l know to be ex-IADG and only recently acquainted with the group, and you," he winked conspiratorially at Jackson, "Dylan Green, as the remaining piece of the puzzle. Or should l say Jackson Oz?"

Before Jackson could pull an answer together the radio crackled and Brown's guy in the lead vehicle said, "Hey, Brown, there's a herd of rhinos up ahead. Looks to be about ten or twelve of them, on the move, headed north.”

“Copy that, let's round 'em up, get ourselves a blood sample for the Doc!" Brown swiveled around and grinned and Tessa and Dariela in the backseat, then at Jackson as he said in his broad Aussie accent, "Well, Jackson Oz, are you ready for a prehistoric rodeo?"

Jackson grinned back at Tessa. Why deny it anymore? "I have already gone a round with one of these guys," he said, "As the rodeo clown.”

***  
The plane was in the air on its way to Alaska. Clementine and Baby Sam were in the kitchen, reheating some of the cold breakfast leftovers for herself and Sam, who was still recuperating in Mitch's room. Abe was working on the sterility cure in the lab and, knowing how little he himself liked to be disturbed when he was in his science zone, Mitch left him to his work and instead migrated to the bar with a tablet, trying to figure out if there were some connection between all of the hybrid animals they knew about that could possibly lead them to the rest they would need, like the links in The Courier had done ten years ago. He barely glanced up when Jamie joined him some time after takeoff, grunting a gruff hello as she went behind the bar and poured them both a drink. He didn't look up at her until she slid onto the barstool next to him, leaning over to see what he had on his tablet. "What are we looking at?" she asked, taking a sip from her cocktail.

He cleared his throat and pulled himself away from the screen taking the glass Jamie slid toward him. "Thank you." He look a long drink, then plunked the glass down and pointed to the tablet screen. "I have been trying to find some kind of connection between the animals Abigail has used to make hybrids. but so far I haven’t been able to come up with a thing. Bears, snakes, wolves, rhinoceros, spiders, goats, mammoths, dinosaurs- they have no common denominator that l can find, unless go back to the original glob of primordial ooze that slithered up onto land." She leaned closer, putting her hand on his leg nonchalantly as she peered at the screen; it honestly wasn't helping his concentration but he certainly wasn't going to ask her to move it either. He noticed she had abandoned her Early Jamie' clothes and was now wearing what he considered Post-Tank Jamie' outfits- skin-tight leather pants and a very complimentary black sweater. He had to admit, while he missed the Jamie of ten years ago, he didnt mind her change in style so much. "How long before we land, and where exactly are we going?”

"Anchorage, about four hours. There have been three reports about our polar bear, all three within a twenty mile radius of the city of Anchorage. When we land we go to the local wildlife refuge, and a park ranger will lead us to where the bear was last seen." Her voice tightened with barely suppressed anxiety, "It's only September and they already have six feet of snow, which is unheard of there." She shivered almost imperceptibly, though Mitch could feel the vibration of her hand that still rested on his thigh and he realized she still hated and feared the cold the way she had after being stranded in Canada so many years ago.

“Hey, it's okay," he said, covering her hand with his, "you don’t have to go, Abe and Clem and l can handle it, you stay here with the baby. He likes you, remember?" He smiled, to lessen the sting he knew she was feeling, the idea that her fear was stronger than herself; his smile faded and he said softly, "Nothing burns like the cold, Jamie. I know you dream about Caraquet, you wake me sometimes, calling out for,” he swallowed and looked away from her, "for Logan, and telling him he has to burn the money because you're freezing…”

She sat back on the barstool sharply, taking her hand away from Mitch's grasp with a jerk and glancing automatically down at her foot, though it had been more than ten years since she had lost her toe to frostbite in the wilds of Canada. "I'll be fine," she said, withdrawing from him at the mention of Caraquet; her PTSD diagnosis had its roots in that town and everything that surrounded it and while she would never step foot in British Columbia again she visited the place often enough in her nightmares. Mitch’s observation was a bit too on the nose because in those awful, paralyzing dreams she was always freezing. so cold she couldn’t move her legs to run, or her arms to fight off the polar bears when they came to attack her and Logan and the other shadowy people on the school bus. In those nightmares Mitch never showed up with the rescue team and they were all killed one by one and then the bear would get its jaws around her throat, claws raking her body as she watched her blood spatter on the windows and she’d wake up in a frigid sweat, hoping she hadn't vocalized the strangled scream that echoed in her mind for hours afterward. 

And now here she was, flying off into the glacial northern wilds of Alaska to get blood from a polar bear, it was like a nightmare and she was trying to keep it together but her voice was bitter and edgy as she said, "I hope blood will be enough for you. I don't think we want to try to get a polar bear the size of my Mustang on the plane.”

“Oh, I don't know," Mitch said testily, draining his glass in one long swallow, trying not to be hurt by her reaction or to think about his own heartache after Caraquet, still so fresh for him; Jamie’s bewildering retreat from their relationship, the confusion brought on by Allison and his father-he suppressed a wave of sadness at the thought of Max- the emotional upheaval and stupid missteps he made with Jamie that pushed her further away, mistakes which he seemed determined to repeat here and now. He reached over the bar and plucked the bottle of vodka from the rack. "Sometimes you have to shoot for the stars."

It was uncomfortably silent as they both retreated to their shells, but then Jamie tapped her fingers on the bar and said, "Stars...stars...what about constellations? There's a bear, snake, and a goat at least." Mitch looked unsure, but it was a straw to grasp at in their awkwardness so she went to one of the drawers behind the bar where they had searched for the CB radio two days earlier. "l think I saw a star chart here somewhere," she bent over to rummage through the drawer, her back to Mitch, giving him a fine view of her posterior, he poured another drink and downed it in a swallow, his eyes never leaving her as he said, "Of course. Who doesn't keep a star chart on a self-flying plane?”

Jamie pulled out a large square of folded paper and peeled the corners back, peering inside, "Here it is." She unfolded the chart and spread it out over the bar. The night sky opened out before them, and Jamie traced a few familiar star formations, learned from countless nights on the farm, laying outside in the grass on warm summer nights, watching the sky and praying to the Gods- any Gods- to save her mother. The frostiness between them was dissipating with the comfort of action, as Jamie quickly scanned a list of the constellations on the side of the poster-with a grid pattern to tell how to find the constellation in the sky- she let out a breath. "There's so many.”

“Some aren't animals though." Mitch ran his finger down the side of the chart, counting rapidly. "Oh." He looked over at Jamie, "Forty-two.”

“Forty-two. Well, that's quite a few." She added under her breath “It's also the meaning of life, the universe and everything.”

Mitch was bent over the chart but he gave her a sideways smirk. "Nerd”

"English major," she corrected.

Mitch pushed his glasses back on his nose and gave her a quick smile then pointed to the list where Canis Venacti, Canis Major, and Canis Minor were grouped together. "Some of these animals are redundant, for instance there are three different constellations named after dogs; Canister Venacti, the hunting dogs, Canis Major, the Big Dog, and Canis Minor, the Little Dog. Same thing with snakes, serpents, there's Hydra, the water serpent, Hydrus, the water snake and Serpens, the serpent. Two bears, nine different kinds of bird, three different horses, if you count a centaur as a horse, which we do, I think?"

"There are several different kinds of birds but no vultures," Jamie said, "maybe she wasn't exact? Maybe she combined DNA from more than one bird?"

"Well, that's easy enough to test," Mitch said. We have one of the things on board."

"There's no rhinoceros here," Jamie said, skimming the list.

"No, but there's a Unicorn. Monoceros, ‘one horn'.” 

"Wait," she said, pointing at the upper portion of the map. "All of these are Northern Hemisphere constellations. Goat, bear, snake, eagle. Unicorn." She shook her head, her red hair swinging to frame her face. "No spider or mammoth though. Or dinosaur."

“But here's Lacerta, the lizard," Mitch said, pointing between Cassiopeia and Cygnus, also in the Northern Hemisphere, "That fits a dinosaur, right? And as for the mammoth," he pointed at another area of the chart, "Cetus, the whale. It's the largest constellation in the Northern sky, and is close to other water signs like Pisces and Aquarius. Whales are the largest mammal but making hybrid whales probably wasn't really an option, or very productive, since they would only threaten sea traffic but the elephant or similar Mammoth is the largest land mammal. Maybe she just adapted. Or maybe we're just grasping at straws.”

“So long and thanks for all the fish," Jamie muttered under her breath, then continued, "And here's Aquila, the Eagle, and Cygnus, the Swan. I guess a vulture could be a cross between an eagle and a swan. Long neck, bad attitude?”

Mitch cocked his head to the side in agreement. "Sounds about right.”

The excitement of possibly finding a link, solving a puzzle was growing, and Jamie said, "That's seven of the eight we know about. The spider?”

“Cancer, maybe? It’s a crab, maybe crabs just had too limited a range for her needs, having to stay close to water, but they would be fairly terrifying so, I don't know, this is all conjecture anyway, just like the spiders and unicorns we’re worried about.” He was getting frustrated, she could tell by the set of his shoulders and the ugly tone creeping into in his voice, though he was trying to tamp it down. "So what's left in the Northern Hemisphere?" he asked.

“Leo, scorpius and draco. Lion, scorpion, dragon." Jamie looked up in alarm. "Oh my God, you don't think she made a dragon hybrid do you?"

Mitch added them up, trying not to show his concern either. "Well if she did that's eleven, and unless she's a Stranger Things fan, that's a weird number.”

"Wait," Jamie said, looking at the chart, "there's this one too. Bootes.”

"Bootes?" Mitch said, wrinkling up his nose under his glasses. “What the hell kind of animal is a Bootes?"

"It's not an animal," Jamie said, looking up at him with concern. "It's The Shepherd.”  
***

Getting the sample from the rhino had been relatively easy, it was the eight foot tall goat that had been the bitch.

They were northwest of Boulder, on the Strawberry river about a mile above Starvation Dam in Utah. They had gotten a sample from the rhinos after Jackson snuck up on one with a needle and syringe and ran like hell when the beast turned on him. Brown waited a second or two before turning on the hybrid repellant frequency, just for a laugh, and he was whooping as Jackson jumped into the truck, brandishing the syringe and breathing heavily as the herd thundered away. 

They kept going northwest until they came to the dam, and Brown started to tell them how the place acquired it's odd name. “So the party of fur trappers were caught in a blizzard but they stumbled on an abandoned Ute Indian camp, only it wasn’t abandoned and when the men came back from fruitless hunting and discovered their only food devoured by white men, they ousted the fur trappers from the camp, and they stumbled to the banks of the river to die of the cold. But in a cruel twist of fate, the Indians perished also because the trappers had eaten the only food they had and they were trapped by the storm.”

“Well that's depressing," Dariela said. "Remind me not to tell it to Isaac for a bedtime story." Thunder rumbled in the distance and a dense brown cloud rolled across the rocky landscape around the river. Brown rolled to a stop beside a large rock formation, with lots of crevices and holes and he got on the radio shouting, "Abandon vehicles! Cover in the rocks!"

Jackson grabbed his rifle and his backpack, helped Tessa and Dariela out and they all ran in confusion to the rocky formation, ducking down into sheltered caves made by the boulders, Brown and his four remaining men jumped down among them, and they crouched down as the rumbling grew louder and louder and the ground began to vibrate beneath them. The rocks began to shake and pebbles and sand sifted down on them as the light suddenly vanished beneath thundering so loud Jackson couldn't even think. He looked up and all he could see was flashes of shadow and bright fur, he looked sideways at Brown who shouted, "Goats!”

Jackson pulled a ready syringe from his backpack, took off the safety cap and motioned for Brown to hoist him up. Brown looked at him like he was insane, then shrugged uneasily and motioned to one of his men to help lift Jackson close to an opening in the rocks.

He waited, knowing he was only going to have one blisteringly quick chance to get any blood at all from one of these monstrous creatures. Now that he was so close he could see them a little more clearly and they were huge- the hooves that flashed within inches of his head were easily the size of dinner plates and looked to be frighteningly sharp. Taking a deep breath, he waited until a shadow was just right, then jabbed the needle up, pulling the plunger as soon as he felt contact and jerking the syringe back down through the rocks as his unwilling subject squealed and kicked, catching his wrist with one of those deadly hooves.  
Blood sprayed from his wrist as Brown brought him down; his hand suddenly wouldn't work right and Dariela darted forward to catch the syringe before he dropped it. Miraculously, it seemed to be filled with enough blood for Mitch's uses.

Tessa ran to Jackson, supporting him as she checked his wrist, which was still bleeding but not spraying, and he grinned at her and whispered, "Spicy.”

The herd had passed, a thin haze of dust floated in the air, and after a few minutes Brown climbed out of the rocks and descended back to the riverside. The trucks were destroyed, turned over and trampled into junk, and Jackson and Dariela ran to the one they had been in, digging around for the cooler. Tessa found the first aid kit and wrapped Jackson's wrist and Dariela found the cooler intact, prying open the lid briefly to check the rhino sample and add the goat. "It's all good." Dariela said, "but who is gonna carry this thing? Because those trucks aren't going anywhere.”

“Anybody have a radio?" Tessa asked. "I think we need to call a cab.”  
***

They lost track of time going over the star chart, knowing that it was probably a useless endeavor but needing something to do to feel productive. The plane's cool, pleasant PA voice interrupted them when it chimed and said, “Wheels down in Anchorage, one hour." Mitch stretched his arms over his head, groaning at the aching muscles in his shoulders as he leaned away from the chart, thankful that Jamie had changed the plane's voice back from Logan. "So, tell me what we have," he said, as he rubbed his eyes under his glasses.

“Well," she said, "If we run with the Northern Hemisphere constellation theory we have to find a scorpion, a lion, and," she sighed as if she couldn’t believe she was about to utter the words, “a dragon. And a Shepherd”

"The dragon could refer to a Komodo Dragon, but that wouldn’t be much better, those guys are nasty. A Shepherd," he repeated, pushing his glasses back up again, “that can only be Abigail. We need to contact Jackson, tell him what we found and what he needs to be looking for."

Jamie snorted a bitter laugh. "Hey, Jackson, be on the lookout for a dragon!”

Mitch shrugged. "No stranger than a wooly mammoth or a prehistoric rhinoceros. Or earthquake sloths for that matter.”

“Maybe not.” The chilliness between them earlier had gone, but something was up with her, there was something else she wanted to say, he could tell by the way she played with her straw and looked studiously away from him and he sighed, reaching forward to touch her face gently. “What is it, Jamie? I can hear the gears grinding in your head from here.”

It had been nagging at the back of her mind for a while now since finding him alive, - or if she really wanted to pinpoint it, since the first time he put his glasses on and looked at her with his deep brown eyes, and she actually knew it was him, so familiar behind the plastic frames- a kind of unease, a fingernails blackboard feeling, and with the mention of Caraquet earlier, the subject of the cold, she realized what it was that was bothering her: guilt. Guilt for being so distant with him before he...he died, guilt for squandering the time they had on misunderstandings and anger; she had beaten herself up for years over it but managed to put it behind her but here he was, her regret made flesh and bone before her. "I'm sorry, Mitch." She stopped him, knowing he was about to say something about Duncan but she had apologized for that already and this went much deeper. She took a deep breath and said, "I'm sorry for how l treated you after l came back from Canada. I'm sorry for all of the time I wasted between us because.. because you had gone on living after you thought I was dead.” The words came tumbling out before she could stop them, and truthfully, she found she didn't want to stop them. She was tired of secrets and lies and darkness. Mitch was the person she trusted most in the world, he was the man she loved, he was her path to the light and she wanted him to know everything while they had time to say it because they had both learned in excruciating ways how easy it was to lose each other in the blink of an eye. She'd almost lost him again over the Duncan fiasco and she knew she couldn't bear to lose him again, and she was going to do whatever it took to make sure she didn’t. "I'm sorry," she gripped the hand that was caressing her cheek and held it tightly, "I'm sorry l gave up on you. knew you weren't dead, l knew it in my heart, I looked for you for years, I followed every lead, l went to Pangaea...I interrogated every Shepherd l caught because I hoped that one would have information that would lead me to you, alive. And then...I lost hope and l gave up. I gave up on you, Mitch Morgan.” She took a deep, hitching breath as tears started to run down her cheeks. "You were alive and l loved you and I gave up on you.”

The only noise was the soft rumble of the planes engines, and Mitch pulled her close as she wet his shoulder with her tears. "When we were on the plane from Africa to DC," he murmured huskily in her ear, "and you kissed me, I couldn’t believe it was happening, couldn't believe that you wanted me, because l had been in love with you since the day you took me to your mother's grave, amazed at the way you were so open about her and how you felt and I- I had been avoiding my emotions for so long...l hid it, because was afraid of a relationship, I was afraid of you, of what you could do to me mean to me if let you in." He swallowed hard, and kissed her forehead. "And when I did let you in, BAM! You were gone-“ he choked a little at the memory of the plane falling, feeling Jamie's hand torn from his as they spun into the icy North Atlantic sea, how he screamed her name and swam from floating body to floating body until Jackson forced him onto a rescue boat, saving him from drowning because he would have died trying to find her. "You were gone, and I didn't go on living. I gave up on everything except trying to drown myself at the local bar. You were alive, I loved you, and I gave up on you too. After only three months, I may add.” He was quiet a moment, feeling her breathing against him. "I’m the one who should be apologizing.” He put his finger under her chin and lifted her face to his. “Then I got a miracle call, and had a reason to live again," he whispered, wiping Jamie's tears away as she gave him a sniffling smile that he returned, remembering how it felt to hear her voice that morning at the bar, to realize that she wasn't gone, that he had a second chance. His heart started to hammer and he rasped, “How about we don't waste anymore time on the past? We have about forty minutes until we land, I bet we can find something to do until then.”  
****

“I have something else to tell you." Jamie said, and Mitch peeled an eye open and looked over at her, sprawled against him on the bed.

“No good conversation has ever started with those words," he said, and with a groan lifted his arm to look at his watch. "You have about ten minutes to talk before the plane starts yelling at us to get up for school.”

She rolled over on her side and kissed his chest lightly. "Abe stopped me in the hall shortly after we took off, he wants me to be his test subject for the sterility cure. The formula is finished, he wants to test it soon and since Clem is already fertile, and Dariela isn't here…” His body stiffened almost imperceptibly but she felt it and frowned slightly to herself as she continued, "Anyway, it would only be a test to see if it produces a normal ovulation cycle and a viable egg.”

“So what are you going to do? Wh..what did you tell him?" He looked like a deer trapped in the headlights and she felt kind of bad for springing it on him here, like this. She hadn't meant to, she had intended to bring it up as soon as she found him at the bar but he had been so into his research that she didnt want to interrupt, and well, the time had just never seemed right. Sure, Jamie, this is really the right time.

“I told him that I had someone else to consult about it." she said, looking up at him until he met her eyes. "I think the person who shares my bed every night has a say in whether or not we can suddenly make babies." She felt him relax a little, though he was still eyeing her warily, as if she might produce a child at any time and thrust it at him. She would have found it funny if his reaction wasn’t mildly insulting. "What do you think l should do?”

“I think it's up to you," he said, as he remembered a very important point about the current world. “I’m still sterile so if you want to be the guinea pig who saves the world, go ahead.”

"You're the pig here, Morgan,” she retorted, and then with a flick of her wrist stirred the shit pot just a little. "Are you though? Sterile?" She sat up, the sheet falling away from her as she rose from the bed, bending down to pick up her clothes and Mitch felt himself start to rise even though they had just- God, she was beautiful. He dragged his attention back to what she was saying with difficulty. "Have you been tested since you came back? Because you went into the tank before the TX-14 gas had spread and by the time you came out the gas was probably diffused into the atmosphere enough to not affect you. And there's no telling what Abigail did to you, or what she had planned, she was probably going to make a family of little Abby/Duncan hybrids to rule over her apocalypse kingdom!"

Mitch shot out of the bed liked he'd been fired from a rifle with a look of panicked horror that was so comical Jamie burst out laughing as he pulled his boxers from his pile of clothes on the floor. "That's not funny." he snapped, pulling his clothes on hastily, as if he was suddenly afraid Abigail was going to burst in and force herself on him. It was obvious that this was something that hadn't occurred to him and she was immediately sorry- after all, in Mitch's world three weeks ago his daughter was eleven and now she was twenty and he was a grandfather. Things were upside down for him.

Before she could apologize there was a tentative knock at the door and Abe's somewhat embarrassed voice floated in. “Uh, Jamie? Sorry to...bother you but Jackson just called, they have run into some problems. Apparently their convoy was destroyed by a...” his reluctant sigh was audible through the door. "A dragon.”  
***


	7. What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger

WHAT DOESN’T KILL YOU MAKES YOU STRONGER

Remind me that the most fertile lands  
Were built by the fires of volcanoes.  
~Andrea Gibson, The Madness Vase

It was slow going, trudging along the rocky, boulder-strewn banks of the Strawberry River, made slower by the rickety, improvised travois that was hauling the sample cooler and a few spare weapons they had managed to salvage from the ruined trucks. Everything else had been absolutely destroyed by the thundering goat herd, and all of their phones carrying the hybrid repellant frequency had long since lost battery power. Morris Brown remembered some kind of a maintenance shack at the edge of Starvation Dam, he didn't think it would be manned anymore but there could be a radio. The dam was only a mile or so away but the terrain was so rough they were not making good time, it was hot and there was little vegetation and scant shade, but when the sun went down the heat would dissipate quickly and it would be best if they were inside if possible.

Tessa and Dariela trudged along together at the head of the line, scanning the rocks and hills ahead for danger. They were both drenched in sweat, and Tessa wiped her brow and said, "This humidity is nuts. We're in the desert."

"We're close to a river." Dariela replied, flicking the sweat from her own forehead, "that would explain some of the humidity, but it’s still really wet out here.”

Tessa panted a few more steps "So, how is Abe doing on the sterility cure?”

Dariela shrugged "He was close to a cure when left. Really close." Tessa hadn't hidden her eagerness for the answer. "You and Jackson going to…?”

Tessa grinned and glanced at Jackson, who was trailing the travois, protecting it from the rear. "I don't know, I mean l want to, I hope he does.”

“I'm going to have two more," Dariela said, looking dreamily up into the barren hills. "I want a girl, at least one." She stopped, pointing up at one of the rocky outcroppings. It was smeared black with soot and she observed, "Looks like there must have been some kind of fire here.”

“Maybe," Tessa gestured at the desolate terrain, "But it doesn’t seem like there's enough fuel around here for much of a fire."

They made it to the dam and any hope of finding help was dashed, Jackson could tell immediately it had not been maintained in some time. The operators had left the spillway open and water crashed ten stories down to the rocks below, forging heavy spray that thickly fogged the river bottom. Cracks zigzagged up the concrete walls and various bushes and grasses sprouted from every orifice where they could get a hold in the side The guard shack could be seen at the top, on the opposite side of the river, which meant they had to cross the derelict dam.

Jackson sighed and they started up the rock-studded cliffs to the top: he, Tessa, and Dariela in the lead, Brown and two of his men pulling the travois, and Brown's other two men guarding their back. They reached the top and started across the spine of the levee. It was narrow, only about ten feet wide, with a dizzying fall to the rocks on one side and a deep reservoir on the other, though as Jackson swept the reservoir he saw something slither through the water towards them. "Heads up!" he shouted, pointing to the wake the monster was leaving in the water, "Water snake! A huge one! Watch the side!”

They started across the dike, slowly, everyone on alert, guns raised. Their concentration was on the reservoir, watching the water for the snake but a loud, rhythmic thumping, like helicopter blades but slower, heavy and dark in the fog below the dam got their attention. Jackson stopped the team to tell them to turn back- if the ramshackle structure was about to collapse they didn't want to be in the middle of it but the whup-whup sound got louder and he could feel the very concrete vibrating beneath his feet and his bones vibrated in the core of his body and suddenly the dusky gray cement of the dam was shaded by a giant black shadow, an unearthly shriek rent the air around them and they all cowered as the shadow soared over them, flapping its leathery black and silver wings as it passed, creating a wind so fierce it nearly knocked Jackson down.

“Holy shite,” Brown said, his jaw dropping. "Is that a...dragon?”

It looked like a huge razorback that had been given wings, all glistening silver and black spikes and huge, slavering teeth and it's long, jagged tail swiped at the two men bringing up the rear as it passed, knocking them screaming from the dam, down to the rocky river below. "Run!" Jackson shouted, and they all sprinted for the other side, but Brown and his two remaining men lifted their rifles and started firing at the monster, Jackson ran back to grab the travois Brown's men had dropped as the dragon circled around, pulled up even with Brown and his men and let loose a stream of fire from his searing jaws that turned Brown and his men to ashes echoing with agonizing screams. Jackson fell to the ground behind them, feeling the scorching fire as it passed over him, trying to get as low as he could as the dragon circled again, then dove back toward the bottom of the dam, disappearing into the misty fog.  
Jackson sprang to his feet and ran, catching Dariela and Tessa as they reached the guard shack, broke open the door and dove in, slamming it shut as they sat silent but for their ragged breathing. "Jesus," Jackson croaked, reaching over to Tessa to make sure she was okay. "Is everyone alright?"

Dariela sat up, panting with terror, leaning against a metal desk that took up the majority of the little room. "Brown and his men sure aren’t. That thing barbecued them."

Jackson rose slowly to his feet, favoring his injured wrist as he used the desk for leverage. "Let's see if we can find a radio. As much as I hate it, we need Jamie to come back for us.”  
***

Abe was discreet enough to leave while they finished getting themselves together, and Jamie picked up the navigational tablet and changed their course back to the south, at least heading them in the direction of Jackson until she could find out exactly where he was.

"So, a dragon, and apparently not the Komodo type," Mitch said as he sat on the bed, jerking his shoes on testily. “Things just keep getting better and better."

He was still hot about the Abigail/Duncan remark and she dropped onto the end of the bed beside him and leaned against his solid warmth, trying to communicate with her body what she found so hard to put into words. Sometimes it amazed her that as someone who organized words into stories for a living, when it came time to use them in her personal life, her command of them usually deserted her at the most critical junctures. "I'm sorry,” she apologized softly, "about what I said. I'm going down to tell Abe yes, l will test the fertility cure for him," she raised her gaze to his and said fiercely, "because if there are going to be any little Mitch Morgan hybrids running around here, they are going to be mine.” The kiss this time was deeper, longer, intensely possessive, then she was gone, leaving his lips burning and his brain spinning; the bio-drive in his head had been a cakewalk compared to what Jamie was doing to him at the moment, springing babies and fertility on him with no warning and hurling unadulterated commitment at him with such careless abandon. He needed a drink but instead of heading for the bar he found his feet carrying him to the computer lab, where he knew he would find Jamie.

He walked in to Abe's deep, smooth voice, "Jackson couldn't give me much information, the battery in his radio was almost dead. They are on the Strawberry River in Utah, some place called Starvation Dam. Brown and his team was wiped out by the – I can’t believe am saying this - dragon. He has enough radio power left for me to contact him and let him know where to meet us.”

Jamie went to her bank of computers and Mitch joined her, resting his hand lightly on her shoulder in a gesture of forgiveness as she pulled up real-time detailed satellite pictures of the Starvation Dam area and started scanning through them rapidly, searching for a place that would make a suitable landing spot for the plane. "What about the IADG?” she asked, "Do they have a team closer that can extract him? We're still at least two or three hours away.”

"No." Abe said in a tone that made them both look up from the satellite pictures. "The IADG evacuated east of the wall, and they are trying to help people flee. The hybrids are spreading, even though it hasn't even been 48 hours. Look," he tapped on one of the computers and a news broadcast came on, a somber newscaster recounting the horrible things happening in Boulder as people's pets and farm animals were being killed by some creature or creatures, then coming back as a monster and attacking anyone they came in contact with, even their owners. The accompanying video was littered with the bloodied bodies of humans and animals alike.

Mitch shook his head in frustration at the news but without the samples there wasn't much he could do about it, and at the moment another question was on the front burner. "We need to get the hybrid repellant frequency information to IADG. It could be useful to them, Abe, can you help me with that?" Mitch jerked his head at the lab and motioned for Abe to follow him. Once they were safely out of Jamie's hearing, Mitch said in a near-whisper, “Um, so Jamie brought up an interesting point a little while ago and I would like to get your opinion on it. Doctor/patient like opinion," he clarified.

They trotted down the stairway to the lab, and Abe's curiosity got the better of him. "I would love to give you my opinion. Doctor patient opinion, of course.”

Mitch stopped on the bottom step. "Jamie seems to think that because I had to be put in the stasis tank well before the twelve hour period it took for the TX-14 gas to spread, and was likely not taken out until the gas had diffused into the atmosphere enough for it to be ineffective on me, l may not be sterile. May not have ever been sterile." He shuddered at the idea of what Abigail could have used him for but pushed the thought away.

Abe nodded his head as Mitch spoke, smiling as the implications and possibilities hit him. "Yes, she is correct, I don't know why I didn't think of it myself. Would you like me to test you?"

“Well, yeah," Mitch whispered snidely, rolling up his sleeve. “Especially since Jamie has agreed to be your little practice egg factory. I kinda want to know what l'm getting into.”

Abe chuckled as he opened a nearby drawer and took out a needle and a glass vial. "I gave her the first treatment a few minutes before you joined us. I wondered if she was going to tell you about it.”

“Well, she did," Abe quickly swabbed Mitch's arm with alcohol, slid the needle in and then removed the vial with a swift movement as Mitch rolled his sleeve back down.

“It seems you two are closer than ever,” he smiled heartily at Mitch, "I am glad to see it. I was afraid that her recent poor decision making would be the end of you two, but it appears to have brought you together." Abe carried the sample to one of the workstations, opened a cabinet and took out a bottle of clear liquid, siphoning out a couple of cc's of the fluid and dropping it into a glass tube. He then used a syringe to withdraw a few drops of Mitch's blood from the vial and added it to the solution, placing a gloved finger over the opening and shaking it gently, "But then, what does not kill you only makes you stronger.”

Mitch rolled his eyes. "Thanks for the words of wisdom, Obi Wan. I should look like the Hulk by now.” He jerked his head at the tube in Abe’s hand. “How long is this going to take?" Abe just smiled as he stopped shaking the mixture and held the glass tube up to the light.

The liquid had turned a bright blue and the delight on Abe’s face was the only answer Mitch needed. “Oh-kay. Well, that was faster than l expected." He took a deep breath and cut his eyes at Abe, just to be sure. “I’m not sterile?”

“No, my friend, you are not," Abe chuckled, patting Mitch on the back. "Congratulations!”

“Yeah,” Mitch replied tersely, handing Abe a small drive from his pocket; he suddenly needed a drink. "The hybrid repellant frequency information is on this drive, get it to the IADG, I’m going to go see if Jamie has come up with anything." He ducked out of the lab, clattering up the stairs to the bar where he poured himself a shot, downed it in one swallow, then marched down the hallway to what had been his room, knocking softly on the door until Clem opened it. She was holding Baby Sam to her breast while he nursed, and Mitch recoiled as she pulled the door open, turning away and covering his eyes. "Come on, Clem," he said, "I know it's just a biological function but you're my daughter and I am barely used to you having a baby much less…lady…parts…” he finished lamely as his daughter rolled her eyes and turned her back on him, motioning for him to come into the room. Sam was sleeping in Mitch's bed and he looked much better, though Mitch was fairly sure it was the nurse more than the nursing that was helping him heal.

"What's up, Dad?" Clem asked, laying baby Sam over her shoulder and covering herself up. She patted his back gently until he let out a loud, drooling belch, then she gently wiped his mouth and handed him to his grandfather. Mitch handled the bundle awkwardly for a second, then got Sam comfortably tucked into his arms and he cooed and smiled over the baby, marveling at the little creature that was his grandson. "So, we have turned around and we are headed to Utah to rescue Jackson, Tessa, and Dariela. Apparently they were attacked by a – bear with me here - dragon, and need a ride.”

"A dragon? Like a fire-breathing giant lizard?” Clem asked in surprise, then grinned as she said softly, "Grandpa would have loved that. A truly mythical monster." She caught Mitch’s expression and added, "But that's not why you're here, is it?"

“Uh, no, it isn't." He kissed his grandson on the forehead and muttered, "I need to talk to you. About Jamie. A...situation has come up and you are probably the only person who can tell me what I need to know."  
Clementine folded her arms across her chest and stared at her father "Well, am intrigued. What kind of situation?"

Mitch lifted the baby in his arms a fraction and said, "This kind." He wrinkled his nose as a particularly noxious smell reached him and he handed Sam back to his mother and said, "Your department, Mom." Clem took her baby and took a whiff too, turning her face away with a grimace. "Anyway, Jamie brought up an interesting point earlier, that because of my time in the stasis tank I may not have been sterilized with the rest of the world, so l had Abe test me. Turns out Jamie was right, I am a fully functional baby-maker, and in a really fun twist, Jamie has agreed to be Dr. Kenyatta's sterility cure lab rat and has already taken the first treatment-“

Clem interjected, "Does Jamie know? About you?"  
"Well, not definitively. yet. She suspected it, it was her suggestion-“

"Tell her now." Clem was immediately serious. "This isn't the kind of thing you keep from someone.”

“I know, Clem, but that is kind of the reason I'm here." He felt his face flush hot with embarrassment, and glad that Clem wasn’t looking at him, plowed ahead. "I haven't asked you much about.. what it was like, for you, growing up, but l need to know... what was she like? As a mom, when you lived with her." It was still painful, knowing how much he had missed of her life, and between lack of time to talk and the unpleasantness of the beer revelation he hadn't asked her much about her past, with Jamie or with Max.

Clem smiled as she lay Sam out on the bed, swiftly removing his soiled diaper. “She was amazing. We struggled at first, I mean we were both very sad and very angry and she blamed herself for...well, for a lot of things. But she tried to make it as normal as she could, made sure l went to school, and ate healthy food, and did my homework, and we went to the movies, and museums-“ she stopped at the look of wistful sadness on Mitch's face. "And she made sure I knew you, who you were, what you did, everything about you. She talked about you all the time and she would just glow, thinking about you made her light up, even in front of Logan," Mitch smiled at that, and his heart twisted around Jamie's a little more. "I know she's different from who you remember, but she's still Jamie." She paused as she deftly re-swaddled the baby and cuddled him close as he closed his eyes in contentment.

"We’ve only been together for a couple of weeks...it's a little sudden-“

Clem scoffed at his reasoning. "You and Jamie have been together for eleven years, Dad, you just spent some of it apart."

“Some of it? That's a bit of a stretch," he snorted in turn, then added, "but I get your meaning." He sighed irritably and rolled his head to the side, squinting at Clementine. "She told me today that she wanted to make little Mitch Morgan hybrids.”

Clementine burst out laughing. "I know you aren't the best at reading women, but that's pretty straightforward." She smiled and held up her son, freshly changed, sleeping soundly in her arms. "Just think about it. A kid that's half you, half Jamie? That's going to be one brilliant know-it-all little badass.”  
***

She was still flicking through satellite photos when he came back to the computer lab/kitchen, carrying a bottle of vodka and two glasses. He poured her a drink and handed it to her as he snarked, "If you get pregnant you cant drink for at least nine months.”

She didnt raise her eyes from the screen but took the glass and swallowed a long, deep draught before replying, "Well, that’s a deal breaker, then."

"Good to know, Ill make sure I keep the bar stocked." He pulled up a chair and sat down next to her, looking over her shoulder at the barren desert in the satellite photos. "Because it turns out you were right." He took another swallow of his drink.

"I know I am,” she replied cheekily, "Can you be more specific?"

"Very funny," he retorted. "You know what mean."  
Jamie leaned back in her chair, her usually warm brown eyes afire as she turned to him. "And how do you feel about that?"

"Confused. Stunned." He paused, and took another swallow of his drink, meeting Jamie's eyes over the rim of the glass as she quirked an eyebrow at him. "Excited.” He broke their gaze, suddenly wanting to look anywhere but her. “Scared. ”

Jamie was quiet for a few seconds, then she leaned forward in her chair and took the bottle from Mitch, pouring herself another drink. “l never thought would want to be a mother. When my friends were all pushing baby dolls in carriages and playing with Barbies, I was playing reporter and asking my uncle about dairy prices and hog futures." She chuckled a little to herself at the memory, then raised her gaze to meet Mitch's. "Then my mother died and you know how it went from there. Children were never a priority, they were an afterthought, something l would consider after l brought Reiden down, after l avenged my mother, and my hometown, and everyone else they had destroyed-“ she reined herself in, swallowing the words at the tip of her tongue and a paused a second to collect herself before she continued, "And then you came along, with your lions acting lion-y, and your genius theories, and love for your daughter," she laughed with a rueful shake of her fiery hair, “and your inexplicable faith in me despite my obvious shortcomings, and for the first time l allowed myself to think about a family with you, and with Clementine, and who knows? Maybe that's what we would have done in Maine but," she looked away from him, "fate had other plans, didn't it?”

“I wanted you to be Clementine's family," Mitch said gruffly.

“It's not the same and you know it," Jamie replied sharply. "But even if you hadn’t…died, we would have been sterilized, so I came to terms with it, just like the rest of humanity. Even when you came back to me, I didn't let myself dream of family again, I was too far down the rabbit hole.” She stopped, her gift of words deserting her again so she set her drink down and took his hands. "Then the other night, I held your grandson, Mitch, and l looked into those beautiful little eyes, held that tiny little hand in mine and something in me changed. My...priorities changed.”

Abe's deep baritone interrupted their silence. "I just finished up with the IADG, they are very appreciative for the information and they are going to implement the repellant frequency as widely and as quickly as they can," he poked his head in before entering, making sure he wasn't interrupting anything. "Have you had any luck finding a rendezvous point for Jackson?”

“Ye- yes," Jamie said, taking her hands away from Mitch's and turning back to the computers as Mitch cleared his throat and picked up the vodka bottle and glasses, and Jamie tapped at the screen. "An abandoned highway, about a mile and a half north of the dam. Looks like they built a newer road and didn't tear up the old one. Long enough to land the plane and take off again.”

Abe bent over the screen to take a look and nodded. "Yes, that will do well. Let me get the coordinates and I will radio Jackson immediately. How long before we get there?"

Jamie tapped the screen thoughtfully, doing some mental calculations and said, "About two hours. Give or take." She jotted down the coordinates and handed them to Abe, who pulled a radio from his rear pocket and pressed the call button. Jackson's voice crackled over the speaker. "Give me good news, Abe.”

Abe relayed the coordinates to the makeshift runway to Jackson, who said, "Okay. Be careful, the dragon is still here, flying around. It knows we're still here, it's waiting for us to make a move but the sun is going to set soon, we’ll head out then, maybe it won't chase us in the dark." The radio started to cut out and it crackled as he said, "There's also a giant water snake in the upper portion of the river.”

Mitch interjected, "Tell him to get blood samples if he can!”

Jackson retorted, "Tell Mitch to go fuck himself. He can get his own samples if he wants them."

Abe and Jamie laughed, but the gears started turning in Mitch’s head. "Copy that," he answered, and let Abe finish the radio call before asking, "I have an idea. I think we can get some dragon blood. Do you still have the sample collecting crossbow you got on Pangaea?”  
***


	8. Even Dragons Have Their Ending

EVEN DRAGONS HAVE THEIR ENDING

Fairy tales are more than true, 

Not because they tell us dragons exist, 

But because they tell us dragons can be beaten.

~Neil Gaiman

It was dark when the plane landed on the abandoned highway, surrounded by velvety darkness and the empty desert. The hybrid repellant frequency was radiating around the plane, acting as protection from whatever monsters were lurking out there, but just in case it wasn't effective against dragons Abe, Mitch, Jamie and Clementine all waited in the vehicle bay, heavily armed and tense as the cargo door dropped. Mitch rubbed his clean shaven jaw, feeling almost a little naked without the scruffy, stubbly beard but every time he had seen himself in the mirror the reflection was Duncan and he was ready to rid himself of the last vestiges of Duncan-hood once and for all. He had even enlisted Clementine to do something approximating cutting his hair, though she had warned him beforehand that she was better with a wrench than a pair of scissors. Still, the result was passable and he started to feel a little less like Post-tank Mitch, and more like himself, a feeling bolstered when he found one of his old plaid shirts hanging in the back of Jamie's closet, and he grinned as he slid it on, Jamie's soft scent wafting up from it. 

When he had joined them all in the bay, Abe saw him first and bellowed, "Well! Hello Mitch Morgan!" with a chuckle, Jamie glanced up from the weapon rack quizzically and her breath caught in her throat but she recovered quickly, looking him over and breaking into a brilliant smile before turning her attention back to the armory. With the press of a button the gun rack opened to reveal a deep, recessed shelf behind it she reached in and pulled out a long, wide case, and Mitch lunged forward to help her with it as she slid it out of the compartment.

He grunted as he caught the end of the case and helped her lower it to the ground. "Ugh, this is heavy. What is it, a case of bricks?" Jamie was busily unlatching the case and she swung it open in triumph, revealing a rocket launcher and a pair of wicked looking missiles. "A rocket launcher?" he asked incredulously, "Really?” 

She shrugged, picking up the massive weapon with practiced ease. "You never know when you'll have to blow another plane out of the sky. Or a fire breathing dragon."

“I don't even want to know where you got that thing," he said as she swung it up to her shoulder, opening the sighting mechanism in one swift movement. "Or how you know how to handle it like that.” 

Clem piped up, "Speaking of fire-breathing dragon, how long exactly would the plane hold up under an attack from one?"

That had been concerning Jamie too. "The carbon fiber is rated for high temperatures but only for short periods of time. I don't know how hot dragonfire is but I am going to assume that anything longer than three or four minutes will burn through the sheathing and to the actual skin of the plane, which would be very, very bad. Let's hope we don't have to worry about it.” 

Now they waited in the open bay; the night air was cool and Jamie felt prickles on her arms, whether from the chill or fear she wasn't sure. A light flashed in the distance and everyone snapped to attention, watching the light as it bobbed closer; within a few seconds moving shadows were visible, though they stayed silent as they approached the plane. The shadows finally trotted onto the plane and Clem immediately pulled the lever to close the bay door, and as it clanged closed they all let out a collective breath and greeted each other enthusiastically. Abe hugged Dariela tight, then drew Jackson to him in a giant bear hug.

Jackson thrust two vials at Mitch and panted, "They were refrigerated until we left the dam, about forty minutes ago. I couldn't risk trying to carry the cooler.” 

Mitch patted him on the back, cutting him off, "No, this is great. I'm going to go get them in the lab right away.”

"Sorry l couldn't get the dragon or the snake, it was just too dangerous," Jackson apologized, unconsciously touching his injured wrist. "Those are rhino and goat.”

“These are great, two more pieces to the puzzle," Mitch replied, and he motioned at Jackson's injury. "Get Abe to check that wrist. Tomorrow we are going on a little hunting trip and we’re gonna need you in good working order.” 

Jackson wasn't really surprised that the plan was in place to go after the dragon and the snake, but he asked, "Are you sure that's a good idea?” 

Mitch shook his head. "No, but I'm sure l'm on the right track here, Jackson, know in my gut that these samples are the key to stopping Abigail, the hybrids, fixing everything. We need them and if we have to battle a dragon to get one, that's what we have to do.” 

Jackson stared him steadily in the eye but he knew Mitch was right, fighting monsters was what they had been doing for twelve years and he wanted to stop his sister - the biggest monster of them all - more than anything in the world. Destroying what she probably considered a masterpiece of genetic manipulation would be satisfying, but he would never be happy until the hybrids were exterminated and she was behind bars- or dead. He nodded solemnly at Mitch and said, “We’ll do what we have to do.” 

Mitch stayed in the lab while everyone else retired to the bar, but Jamie brought him a drink that he accepted gratefully, taking a long swallow before joining her at the computer where he had been working. "They're upstairs talking about the dragon,” Jamie picked up one of the vials of blood and turned it this way and that, studying it in the dim, metallic light of the lab. "Dariela said it was basically a flying razorback the size of an elephant that breathes a jet of fire a hundred feet long. So, you know, nothing we can’t handle," She smiled and gestured at his array of screens. "Find anything out?" she asked, and he hurriedly swallowed the last of drink before plunking the glass down on the desk and taking the vial from her, placing it back in its tray and taking her hand.

“Not yet, I am still processing the samples. I needed to chill them first to keep them stable before I actually started working, so I’ll be here a while." He glanced sideways at her and asked, "Wanna stay with me? Help save the world again?" 

She kissed him, his lips bitter with the taste of the vodka, his arms warm around her, but she pulled away after a few seconds, slightly breathless and flushed. "Rain check. Gotta take care of a few things, but I'll be back to help you because that's me, Jamie Campbell, helper of saving stuff.” She motioned at the computers, “You get back to work, Doctor.” 

He did just that, losing himself in the work, the answer to puzzle that would save them all. His brain was in science mode, and the next time he looked at the clock he realized she had been gone for two hours. He wondered vaguely where she was but he was too busy to wonder for long. The next time he looked up, Jamie had poked her head into the lab, and asked him, "Are you hungry?” 

He was famished, suddenly, and he nodded, stripping off his gloves and washing his hands quickly before making his way into the kitchen, where Jamie had set out two bacon and cheese sandwiches and two glasses of chocolate milk. He gave her a lingering kiss of gratitude, then plopped down at the bar and dug into the food. Jamie picked at hers, mostly watching Mitch, and after a few seconds he stopped chewing and asked, "Why exactly, are you staring at me?” 

Her eyes crinkled as she smiled at him. "I like you without the beard. You don't look so grumpy.” 

He rolled his eyes slightly and teased, "Is that why you haven’t been able to keep your eyes of me all night? Don't think I didn’t notice.” 

Her laugh was tinged with bitterness. "You got me. That's exactly why." Her eyes wouldn't meet his and she swallowed as she said softly, "It was a shock. It's was like I’d gone back ten years, and we were on a beach, making plans to go to Maine to get Clementine, to be a family," Her face softened at the memory, and the years fell away from her and suddenly he was with her there on the beach, making plans for a future they would never have and it dawned on him what his ten year absence had really cost her. Allison Shaw's voice echoed back to him through the years. I _know you think she's special and you’re meant to be together, but as someone who knows you very well, you’re not. You’re going to destroy each other._ And so they had. But Jamie had destroyed the old Mitch that Allison knew long before Shaw slithered her way back into his life; he had destroyed Jamie when the last tattered remnants of hope she'd managed to cobble together with him after New Brunswick had been snatched away so violently and abruptly that she'd been shattered, and only through vengeance and anger had Jamie pieced herself back together, leaving jagged and sharp edges to protect herself. For the first time he felt a twinge of pity for Logan, because he knew from experience how sharp those edges could be and how deeply she was willing to cut to suit her needs.

“We can start over," Mitch said, taking her face gently in his hands. "We can just pick up from the beach, pretend like the last ten years never happened." He squinted at her. "Might be a bit easier for me than for you."

"I'm sure it would." She shook her head. "But learned a long time ago that there is no going back, so this is where we move on.” 

More words that echoed from the past, more visiting ghosts. 

_Can we do what people do sometimes and start over?_

_Sure, let's...move on._

His face fell, though he tried to hide it behind his glasses, and she put her hand on his arm. Sometimes she forgot that it hadn’t been ten years for him, so those words were still fresh in his mind. "Move on to the next step, together.” *** 

Daylight found Mitch still working in the lab, though Jamie had eventually gone to bed since she knew from experience that, like her, Mitch was single-minded in his own way and once he had a problem in his teeth he was going to worry it to pieces. She stayed with him long enough to learn that the goat's blood and the rhino blood had the same molecular signature as the other samples, and they also had different anomalies. Mitch had worked the anomalous molecules into a figure but there were only four of them it wasn't anything but a bunch of angled lines. They needed more. 

Once in her room she tried to relax but she couldn't, she had pushed him too fast and she knew it. But that was her, wasn't it? Relentless, obstinate Jamie- let her get something on her mind and there was no dislodging it until she was satisfied. It had been the night that they left the plane for the barrier and Abe collapsed from the deflated lung, Clementine thrust Sam into her arms while she grabbed a knitting needle from her bag to save Abe, and while everything else was going on Jamie looked down into that sweet little face and felt that little hand grip her finger, and it was like the rest of the world had ceased to exist until she looked up and Mitch's eyes met hers, and suddenly she wanted it, motherhood. With Mitch.

As the sun came up the crew gathered in the lab to discuss the next move and the plan was pretty simple, to fly over the dam and as soon as the dragon came into range, shoot with the sample collector and then turn on the repellant frequency and hope it didn't have time to fry anyone. It was a sketchy plan, the best they could come up with, but as soon as they told Jackson he shook his head. "That won't work," he said, "the thing is covered in spikes and scales, bullets just bounced right off of it. And the range of that crossbow is only what, a hundred feet at best? We’ll all be fried to a crisp before we get close enough. Bad plan. We have to think of something else.” 

Jamie looked thoughtful, then asked Mitch. "Could we use a missile on it?"

"You really just want to blow something up. don’t you?" Mitch grinned at her over his glasses but shook his head. “I’m not sure there would be enough left of it to collect samples from, and what was left would probably be contaminated. So, no. Try again."

Jamie went to the armory and pulled out another case, opening it next to the launcher. Snug in the padded lining were three small missiles, roughly the size of beer bottles, and a fitting that Dariela picked up and inspected. "Nice, a rifled missile adapter." She picked up one of the missiles and looked it over. "And Demon fire missiles. Tipped with titanium drillbits, the rifling makes them spin at high speeds, basically creating a drill that carries the explosive deep inside whatever the target is before it explodes." 

Jamie chimed in. "A small charge. The missile counts on being internalized before exploding, rather than a huge explosive charge. It would probably scramble the dragon's insides a bit but it won't blow it to pieces and that should leave some part of it uncontaminated, right?"

"Could be," Mitch picked one up and hefted it in his hands before looking around the group. "Anyone have a better idea?" They all looked around at each other but no one volunteered a solution. 

Jamie spoke again. "We also need to be firing from a stationary place, not the plane." She pulled up some satellite pictures of the dam and the surrounding area. "See this bluff here? There's a straight line of sight to the dam from here. Set me down there with the missile launcher, and you guys bring the plane over as bait.” 

Mitch shook his head vehemently. "NO. You are not going down there by yourself, I'm going with you. Jackson obviously knows how to work the plane, he can play captain.”

Dariela said, "I should go to. IF-" she emphasized, "anything should happen to Jamie I am the only one who knows how to use the rocket launcher."

Jamie, Mitch and Dariela perched on a high bluff, some distance from the dam itself, watching the plane as it flew overhead. They could see Jackson and Abe standing on the opened ramp at the rear as they passed. The dragon flew up from the foggy depths of the river and blew a jet of fire at the retreating plane, as it hovered just below the lip of the dam. Jamie pulled the trigger on the launcher, firing a missile that caught the dragon in its long sinuous neck. It screamed in pain and thrashed as the missile bored its way through the flesh and out the other side, drilling into the dam behind it with a horrendous screech, quivering for a scant second before it exploded through the concrete.

"Oh, shit," Jamie breathed as the dam slowly, slowly, began to crack, water pouring out of the fissure, spilling concrete and debris down on to the dragon who was flying awkwardly as blood streamed from the open hole in its scaly neck. It screamed again and tried to haltingly fly away from the dam but suddenly the levee split wide, the entirety of the reservoir pouring over the crumbling lip of the ruined dam, the giant water snake slithered out, landing on the back of the dragon and instantly wrapping itself around the flying beast and they both plummeted downward, two behemoths locked in tooth and claw battle.

Everyone stared open-mouthed as the two hybrids, carried on a wave of water as the dam finally completely broke, washed downstream, writhing and screeching amongst the debris and boulders from the shattered dam.


End file.
